Knowing the correct syntax for any command, function or method is really important in C++ before you can write code effectively. Generally, we need to learn what kind of return type or parameters are used. We can use the helpful features of our IDE such as auto completion to make things easier, or we check online syntax examples. In modern C++ programming, sometimes we see an uppercase T in syntax definitions. You might already know that this T means it is a type, a function template, but what does it mean in reality? What do we mean by T in C++? In this post, we explain what this uppercase T in C++ syntax means.
Table of Contents
What Is T in C++ syntax?
In C++, classes, structs, unions, objects, references, functions including function template specializations, and expressions have a property called type, which both restricts the operations that are permitted for those entities and provides semantic meaning to the otherwise generic sequences of bits.
In modern C++, most of syntax about standard library methods have an uppercase T as a parameter. This uppercase T letter is used for a generic type of class or function template and defines types that do not have names, or it is used as more general for these types and these needs to be referred in C++ development syntax. This T syntax is known as type-id and used in the syntax of deceleration of a variable, function, property, or method. The T type-id syntax is also useful for the future new type addition, it also symbolizes the coming next future type-ids if there is. This syntax also some-like forces that feature additions should be in this general syntax, and new types may be defined on the right-hand side of a non-template type alias declaration.
What does the uppercase letter T mean in C++ classes?
T is generally used for class names of class types, actually they are function templates. For example, we use T in this syntax for constructor.
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T(const T& ) |
This is the same as:
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class_name (const class_name& ) |
Actually this class name refers a function template for this class. Here T is a constructor as below.
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class T { T(const T&) // constructor { } }; |
or T can represent any class name as in the example below.
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class Tmyclass { Tmyclass() // constructor { } }; |
This can be seen in destructor syntax as below.
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~T(); |
This is same as the following:
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~ class_name(); |
This class and its destructor can be defined like so:
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class T { ~T() // destructor { } }; |
In addition, T can represent any class name:
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class Tmyclass { ~Tmyclass() // destructor { } }; |
T type-id is also used in explanations, and it can be used with different forms, in examples: T, T&, T&&, const T&, volatile T&, const volatile T&, T::T(T&), T::T(const T&), … etc. Now, you can understand this T symbol is a class type or a type-id for these types listed above.
What Is T in C++ function templates?
T is used in template parameters, copy constructors, move constructor syntaxes, explanations and in C++ examples. For example, we can use T for each type of parameters in this get_max(a,b) function template.
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template<class T> const T& get_max(const T& a, const T& b) { return (a < b) ? b : a; } |
and we can use it as below:
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int max, x=30, y=17; max = get_max <int, long>(x, y); |
We don’t need to use T. We can use other letters too. For example, we can compare two different types like this:
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template<class T, class U> const T& get_max(const T& a, const U& b) { return (a < b) ? b : a; } |
and we can use this template with different types too:
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int max, i=15; long l=47; max = get_max <int, long>(i, l); |
Here’s more about function template.
What is type naming in C++?
Type naming term is used for class, struct, union, enum, typedef and type alias declarations. When we use type naming syntax, the syntax of the type-id that names type T is the syntax of a declaration of a variable or function of type T as given in some examples above.
Using the T type-id syntax is called as Type naming. T type name can be declared to refer to a type by means of these declarations below.
- class declaration
- struct declaration
- union declaration
- enum declaration
- typedef declaration
- type alias declaration
We use type naming with the identifier omitted, except that decl-specifier-seq of the declaration grammar is constrained to type-specifier-seq, and that new types may be defined only if the type-id appears on the right-hand side of a non-template type alias declaration.
What Is Type T in C++ syntax?
The C++ type system consists of a lot of types. In C++, T may represent a literal type, it can be function, class type (class, struct, union object types), fundamentals type (void, bool, char, wchar_t), compound types (reference, pointer, array, function, enumeration).
Generally when we create a type for a class or template, we use T in front of its name.
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class Tmyclass { public: std::string str; }; |
What Is _t (underscore-t) in C++ syntax?
If you are looking what is _t underscore-t in C++, you can read this post below,
As you see, in Modern C++, we use T for types, mostly for the template functions.
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