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From: horstman@mathcs.sjsu.edu (Cay Horstmann)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: Distinguishing lvalue/rvalue operator[]
Message-ID: <1991Mar4.054915.19566@mathcs.sjsu.edu>
Date: 4 Mar 91 05:49:15 GMT
References: <1991Mar3.202134.17812@mathcs.sjsu.edu>
Organization: San Jose State University - Math/CS Dept.
Lines: 13

I was thinking more about Joe Buck's suggestion to make the distinction
of lvalue/rvalue operator[] by returning an access class, and found another
snag. Suppose you have a variable size integer array and have operator[]
return an instance of class Access with functions
     Access::operator=(int)
     Access::operator int
as suggested. Then the statement
     a[i]++
will not execute. Really, to preserve the "look and feel" of the standard
operator[], it seems that it must return a reference. Or is there some clever
way to overcome this problem?

Cay