Re: default size of STL vector question

From:
 James Kanze <james.kanze@gmail.com>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++
Date:
Sun, 14 Oct 2007 08:23:17 -0700
Message-ID:
<1192375397.390928.249290@v23g2000prn.googlegroups.com>
On Oct 14, 5:25 am, zl2k <kdsfin...@gmail.com> wrote:

What is the default size of a stl vector?


0. Unless you specify a size, a vector is created empty,
without any elements.

Suppose I have integers needs to store in a vector and I know
the max number of integer is, say, 1000. Will it be more
efficient that I first allocate size of 1000 and then use
{vector[counter] = aNumber; counter++} to populate the vector
than by push_back(aNumber)?


It really depends on the implementation, but if you just do
push_back, without any reserve, then it's almost sure that using
push_back will be slower. On the other hand, the difference
between:

    std::vector< int > a( 1000 ) ;
    for ( int i = 0 ; i < 1000 ; ++ i ) {
        a[ i ] = ...
    }

and

    std::vector< int > a ;
    a.reserve( 1000 ) ;
    for ( int i = 0 ; i < 1000 ; ++ i ) {
        a.push_back( ... ) ;
    }

will probably vary between implementations, and even between
processors, using the same implementation.

If instead of int, the vector is of a user defined type with an
expensive constructor and/or expensive assignment, the push_back
will be more favorable.

Of course I need to resize the
vector after it is populated.


Resizing a vector to make it smaller is very, very fast for the
built-in types. If a user defined type has a non-trivial
destructor, however, that destructor will be called for each
element removed by the resize.

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James Kanze (GABI Software) email:james.kanze@gmail.com
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