reference to an array in c++

Question

Question is make an array of 10 integers that's fine ``` int array[10]; ``` Now question is how to make a `reference` to an `array` which I have declared above ? I tried this ``` int &ra = a; ``` But it's giving me error... Please provide me details about this error and how to make `reference` of an `array`.

Accepted Answer

```
int (&ra)[10] = a;
```

Alternatively, you can use a `typedef` to separate this into the type for "array of 10 ints" and having a reference there-to, as in:

```
typedef int int10[10];
int10& my_ref = a;
```

The problem with your `int &ra = a;` is that it tells the compiler to create a reference of type `int` that refers to an `array of 10 ints`... they're just not the same thing. Consider that `sizeof(int)` is a tenth of the size of an array of ten `int`s - they occupy different amounts of memory. What you've asked for with the reference's type could be satisfied by a particular integer, as in `int& ra = a[0];`.

I appreciate it's a bit confusing that `int* p = a;` is allowed - for compatibility with the less type-safe C, pointers can be used to access single elements or arrays, despite not preserving any information about the array size. That's one reason to prefer references - they add a little safety and functionality over pointers.

For examples of increased functionality, you can take `sizeof my_ref` and get the number of bytes in the `int` array (`10 * sizeof(int)`), whereas `sizeof p` would give you the size of the pointer (`sizeof(int*)`) and `sizeof *p == sizeof(int)`. And you can have code like this that "captures" the array dimension for use within a function:

```
template <int N>
void f(int (&x)[N])
{
    std::cout << "I know this array has " << N << " elements
";
}
```

reference to an array in c++

Solution

Problem