how c++ implements the polymorphism internally?

Question

Respected Sir!

i should tell you that what i know and what i don\'t know about the asked question so that you can address the weak area of my understanding.

Answer 1

The Standard says nothing about how to implements the polymorphism. One class one vtbl and one object one vptr is the most popular way. I hope the following pseudocode would be helpful.

typedef struct {
    void (*show)(void* self);
    // more

} person_vtbl;

typedef struct {
      person_vtbl* vtbl;
      char         name[20];
} person;

void person_show(void* self) {
      cout<<"inside ... "<(self)->name;
}
// more

static person_vtbl person_vtbl_ = { &person_show }; // vtbl for person class

void person_ctor(void* self, char const* name) {
      person* p = static_cast(self);
      strcpy(p->name, name);
      p->vtbl   = &person_vtbl  // vptr of person object
}

typedef struct {
    person base;
    int    scale;
} teacher;

void teacher_show(void* self) {
      cout<<"inside the tearch ... "<(self)->scale;
}
static person_vtbl teacher_vtbl_ = { &teacher_show };

void teacher_ctor(void* self, char const* name, int s) {
      teacher* t = static_cast(self);
      person_ctor(&t->base, name);     // construct base part
      t->scale   = s;                  // construct teacher part
      t->vtbl    = &teacher_vtbl_;     // vptr of teacher object
}

// construct teacher :
// person* ptr = new teacher("Zia", 16);

teacher* tmp = static_cast( malloc( sizeof *tmp );
teacher_ctor(tmp, "Zia", 16);  // vptr of tmp points to teacher_vtbl_
person* ptr = &tmp->base;

// call virtual function though pointer
// ptr->show()

ptr->vptr->show(ptr); // call teacher_show(ptr);