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std::array is vastly superior to the C arrays. And even if I want to interoperate with legacy code, I can just use std::array::data(). Is there any reason I would ever want an old-school array?
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A C-Style array is just a "naked" array - that is, an array that's not wrapped in a class, like this: char[] array = {'a', 'b', 'c', '\0'}; Or a pointer if you use it as an array: Thing* t = new Thing[size]; t[someindex]. dosomething();
std::array provides many benefits over built-in arrays, such as preventing automatic decay into a pointer, maintaining the array size, providing bounds checking, and allowing the use of C++ container operations.
So - yes, a pointer can very well be used with STL algorithms.
c-style array as method parameter with size information Of course, the template concept can also be used for a c-style array. Instead of passing a pointer to the first element, you can pass the array as a reference to template function. This will allow to pass the array with its specific size.
Unless I've missed something (I've not followed the most recent changes in the standard too closely), most of the uses of C style arrays still remain. std::array does allow static initialization, but it still won't count the initializers for you. And since the only real use of C style arrays before std::array was for statically initialized tables along the lines of:
MyStruct const table[] = { { something1, otherthing1 }, // ... }; using the usual begin and end template functions (adopted in C++11) to iterate over them. Without ever mentionning the size, which the compiler determines from the number of initializers.
EDIT: Another thing I forgot: string literals are still C style arrays; i.e. with type char[]. I don't think that anyone would exclude using string literals just because we have std::array.
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