What is the purpose of std::make_pair vs the constructor of std::pair?

Question

What is the purpose of std::make_pair?

Why not just do std::pair(0, \'a\')?

Is there any difference between the tw

Answer 1

As @MSalters replied above, you can now use curly braces to do this in C++11 (just verified this with a C++11 compiler):

pair p = {1, 2};