Test for void pointer in C++ before deleting

Question

I have an array in C++:

Player ** playerArray;

which is initialized in the constructor of the class it is in.

In the destructor I have:

delete playerArray;

except when testing the program through Valgrind it says that there are some calls to delete to a void pointer:

 operator delete(void*)

I want to test whether the playerArray is a void pointer before calling delete to avoid this error.

Does anyone know how to do this?

Answer 1

Perhaps you meant delete [] playerArray. You need the [] if the pointer is an array, not a single instance.

Answer 2

Here's how operator delete is defined.

void operator delete(void*) throw();
void operator delete[](void*) throw();

'operator delete' takes a 'void *' since a pointer to any object can be converted to 'void *'.

Note that a void is an incomplete type and hence it is not allowed to delete a void * i.e

char *p = new char;
void *pv = p;
delete pv;            // not allowed

Footnote 78: This implies that an object cannot be deleted using a pointer of type void* because void is not an object type.

In the case where playerarray is a pointer to an array of Players, you most likely want to do it differently. delete pplayer does not do what you want it to.