I am attempting to write a basic first program in allegro

Question

SO, I'm using the latest version and the latest version of Allegro, but on lines 6 and 12 I seem to have encountered some errors that are not yet clear to me. I am very new to C++ as well as Allegro, so any help would be very much appreciated.

For line 6 I have the error message: "expected identifier or '(' before string constant For line 12, I have the error message: "'display' undeclared (first use in this function)

#include<allegro5/allegro.h>
#include<allegro5/allegro_native_dialog.h>

    int main()
    {
        ALLEGRO_DISPLAY "display";

        if(!al_init())
        {
            al_show_native_message_box(NULL, NULL, NULL, "Could not initialize Allegro 5", NULL, NULL);
        }
            display = al_create_display(800, 600);

            if(!display)
        {
            al_show_native_message_box(NULL, NULL, NULL, "Could not create Allegro Window", NULL, NULL);

        }

        return 0;
    }

Answer 1

Change line 6 to:

ALLEGRO_DISPLAY *display;

This line declares a variable named "display" of type (pointer to) ALLEGRO_DISPLAY. So line 12 should no longer cause an error.

Relevant documentation:

• al_create_display
• ALLEGRO_DISPLAY

Answer 2

ALLEGRO_DISPLAY "display";

If you want to declare a variable of type ALLEGRO_DISPLAY with the name display, there should not be quotation marks.

But al_create_display returns not a ALLEGRO_DISPLAY, but a pointer to it, so the correct line would be:

ALLEGRO_DISPLAY* display;