CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c++reference
Praveen Kumar
Praveen Kumar

Reputation: 55

creating reference to a constant variable in C++

compiler says invalid initialization at line 3 I guess creating reference to i, it is telling the compiler that someone wants to change i, I guess this thing came with newer versions of the compilers because i have found this code in most of the books.

int main(){
 const int &i=10;
 int &j=1;
 cout<<j;
 return 0;
 }

Upvotes: 0

Views: 914

Answers (2)

Nik Bougalis
Nik Bougalis

Reputation: 10613

Besides missing an int in const &i=10; the issue with the next line is that you are creating a reference that is not const (i.e. which allows what it refers to to be changed) and the number 1 is a constant. You'd encounter the same problem with the following code:

const int i = 1;
int &ri = i;

It should be obvious why.

Upvotes: 0

John Zwinck
John Zwinck

Reputation: 249652

This:

int &j=1;

Is not valid, because you're creating a non-const reference (which would allow you to modify the referent) from a constant value (which cannot be modified, for obvious reasons).

Do this instead:

const int &j=1;

Also, the line that declares i makes no sense. Just delete it.

Upvotes: 2

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