Checking for a null object in C++

Question

I\'ve mostly only worked with C and am running into some unfamiliar issues in C++.

Let\'s say that I have some function like this in C, which would be very typical:<

Answer 1

You can use a special designated object as the null object in case of references as follows:

class SomeClass
{
    public:

        int operator==(SomeClass &object)
        {
            if(this == &object) 
            {
                    return true;
            }

            return false;
        }


    static SomeClass NullObject;
};

SomeClass SomeClass::NullObject;

void print(SomeClass &val)
{
    if(val == SomeClass::NullObject)
    {
        printf("\nNULL");
    }
    else
    {
        printf("\nNOT NULL");
    }
}