Can I handle class as objects in C++

Question

Here is what I am trying to achieve: I have a list of Classes (Class1 to Classn) which inherit from a main Class I would like to be able to instanciate an object of any of the n classes without having to do a large switch case (or equivalent). something along the lines of:

static ClassPointerType const * const ArrayOfClassTypes[]={ Class1, Class2, .. Classn }; 

static Class *GetObjectOfClass(int i)
{
  return new ArrayOfClassTypes[i](some parameters for the constructor);
}

You can do that in other OO langues like Delphi where you have a TClass type and can get the class of an object... but I was not able to locate the equivalent functionality in C++.

Answer 1

Are you looking for something like this?

template<typename T>
std::unique_ptr<base> make()
{
    return std::unique_ptr<base>(new T);
}

class factory
{
    static constexpr std::unique_ptr<Base> (*fns[])(){make<derived_a>, make<derived_b>};

    std::unique_ptr<base> get_object_of_class(int const i)
    {
        if (i < 0 || sizeof fns / sizeof *fns <= i) {
            return nullptr;
        }

        return fns[i]();
    }
};