Number of arguments in operator overload in C++

Question

I\'m learning C++ and I created two simple hello-world applications. In both of them I use operator overload, but here is the problem. On the first one, I can provide two argume

Answer 1

Suppose you have a class like this:

class Element {
public:
    Element(int value) : value(value) {}
    int getValue() const { return value; }
private:
    int value;
};

There are four ways to define a binary operator such as +.

1. As a free function with access to only the public members of the class:

   // Left operand is 'a'; right is 'b'.
   Element operator+(const Element& a, const Element& b) {
       return Element(a.getValue() + b.getValue());
   }
   

   e1 + e2 == operator+(e1, e2)

2. As a member function, with access to all members of the class:

   class Element {
   public:
       // Left operand is 'this'; right is 'other'.
       Element operator+(const Element& other) const {
           return Element(value + other.value);
       }
       // ...
   };
   

   e1 + e2 == e1.operator+(e2)

3. As a friend function, with access to all members of the class:

   class Element {
   public:
       // Left operand is 'a'; right is 'b'.
       friend Element operator+(const Element& a, const Element& b) {
           return a.value + b.value;
       }
       // ...
   };
   

   e1 + e2 == operator+(e1, e2)

4. As a friend function defined outside the class body—identical in behaviour to #3:

   class Element {
   public:
       friend Element operator+(const Element&, const Element&);
       // ...
   };
   
   Element operator+(const Element& a, const Element& b) {
       return a.value + b.value;
   }
   

   e1 + e2 == operator+(e1, e2)