Does sizeof evaluate at compile-time or runtime?
In almost all cases, sizeof
is evaluated based on static type information (at compile-time, basically).
One exception (the only one, I think) is in the case of C99's variable-length arrays (VLAs).
Almost always compile time. But the following examples might be of interest to you:
char c[100];
sizeof(c); // 100
char* d = malloc(100);
sizeof(d); //probably 4 or 8. tells you the size of the pointer!
BaseClass* b = new DerivedClass();
sizeof(b); //probably 4 or 8 as above.
void foo(char[100] x) {
sizeof(x); //probably 4 or 8. I hate this. Don't use this style for this reason.
}
struct Foo {
char a[100];
char b[200];
};
sizeof(struct Foo); //probably 300. Technically architecture dependent but it will be
//the # of bytes the compiler needs to make a Foo.
struct Foo foo;
sizeof(foo); //same as sizeof(struct Foo)
struct Foo* fooP;
sizeof(fooP); //probably 4 or 8
class ForwardDeclaredClass;
ForwardDeclaredClass* p;
sizeof(p); //4 or 8
ForwardDeclaredClass fdc; //compile time error. Compiler
//doesn't know how many bytes to allocate
sizeof(ForwardDeclaredClass); //compile time error, same reason