CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c++templatesstd
Archarious
Archarious

Reputation: 43

Overloaded ostream operator in template

I got confused in overloading the ostream operator<< for my template class. (unnecessary code deleted)

sparseArray2D.h:

#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

template <typename T>
class sparseArray2D
{
private:
    //...
public:
    //...
    friend ostream& operator << (ostream&, const sparseArray2D<T>&);
    //...
}

template <typename T> 
ostream& operator << (ostream& os, const sparseArray2D<T> &_matrix)
{
//...
    os<<"Overloaded operator works";
    return os;
};

and main:

#include "sparseArray2D.h"

int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
    //...
    sparseArray2D<int> *matrX = new sparseArray2D<int>(10, 9, 5);
    cout << matrX;
    //...
}

No errors and no warnings in VS2012, but in the console I have 8 symbols as link or pointer at object. Like "0044FA80".

What's going wrong?

Upvotes: 0

Views: 521

Answers (1)

Barry
Barry

Reputation: 304132

That's because you're overloading (not reloading) on sparseArray2D<T>, but that is not what matrX is:

sparseArray2D<int> *matrX = new sparseArray2D<int>(10, 9, 5);
//                ^^
cout << matrX;

matrX is a pointer. As such, you're just streaming the pointer - which by default logs its address... which is apparently 0x0044FA80.

What you want is:

cout << *matrX;

Upvotes: 2

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