Returning multidimensional array from function

Question

How do I return a multidimensional array stored in a private field of my class?

class Myclass {
private:
   int myarray[5][5];
public:
   int **         


        

Answer 1

There are two possible types that you can return to provide access to your internal array. The old C style would be returning int *[5], as the array will easily decay into a pointer to the first element, which is of type int[5].

int (*foo())[5] {
   static int array[5][5] = {};
   return array;
}

Now, you can also return a proper reference to the internal array, the simplest syntax would be through a typedef:

typedef int (&array5x5)[5][5];
array5x5 foo() {
   static int array[5][5] = {};
   return array;
}

Or a little more cumbersome without the typedef:

int (&foo())[5][5] {
   static int array[5][5] = {};
   return array;
}

The advantage of the C++ version is that the actual type is maintained, and that means that the actual size of the array is known at the callers side.