Destructor in template class c : How to delete field which may be pointer or not pointer?
c++, destructor, templates
Solution
You can develop two versions for your template. First, write the normal version `template<class T>`. Then, write a second pointer-only version that specializes your template by declaring it like this:
template<class T>
class TArray<T*>
Problem
I have template class `Array` where the template type `T` should be either pointer or not-pointer type. ``` template<class T> class TArray { static const int max_len=100; T* data; int length; public: TArray(){data=new T[max_len]; this->length=0;} void Add(T value){data[length++]=value;} ~TArray(); }; ``` The problem is how to free space, since we can not call `delete` for not pointer types like this ``` template<class T> TArray<T>::~TArray() { //for(int i =0; i < length; i++) // delete data[i]; // NOT WORKING WITH OBJECTS THAT ARE NOT POINTERS !!! delete[] data; } ``` Let's have addition class ``` class A { int* a; public: A(int n){a = new int[n];} ~A(){delete[] a;} }; ``` and make two instances of template class ``` // Create array of doubles TArray<double>* double_array = new TArray<double>(); delete double_array; // Create array of pointers to class A TArray<A*>* A_array = new TArray<A*>(); A* a = new A(5); A_array->Add(a); delete A_array; ``` When I call destructor for `TArray<A*>` I need to call destructor for class `A` but I don't know how, since the commented code in destructor is not compile (C2541) if we make for example array of doubles.