Can we send part of vector as a function argument?
A common approach is to pass iterator ranges. This will work with all types of ranges, including those belonging to standard library containers and plain arrays:
template <typename Iterator>
void func(Iterator start, Iterator end)
{
for (Iterator it = start; it !=end; ++it)
{
// do something
}
}
then
std::vector<int> v = ...;
func(v.begin()+2, v.end());
int arr[5] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
func(arr+2, arr+5);
Note: Although the function works for all kinds of ranges, not all iterator types support the increment via operator+
used in v.begin()+2
. For alternatives, have a look at std::advance
and std::next
.
Generically you could send iterators.
static const int n[] = {1,2,3,4,5};
vector <int> vec;
copy (n, n + (sizeof (n) / sizeof (n[0])), back_inserter (vec));
vector <int>::iterator itStart = vec.begin();
++itStart; // points to `2`
vector <int>::iterator itEnd = itStart;
advance (itEnd,2); // points to 4
func (itStart, itEnd);
This will work with more than just vector
s. However, since a vector
has guaranteed contigious storage, so long as the vector
doesn't reallocate you can send the addresses of elements:
func (&vec[1], &vec[3]);
The latest (C++20) approach is to use std::span
. Create a std::span
that views a part of std::vector
and pass it to functions. Note: the elements must be continuous in memory to use std::span
on a container, and std::vector
is continuous in memory.
#include <span>
std::vector<int> int_vector = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
std::span<int> a_span(int_vector.data() + 2, int_vector.size() - 2);
for(const int a : a_span);
for(const int& a : a_span);
function(a_span);