Question

I am trying to initialize a reference object through the initialization list in the class constructor and I would need your inputs on why I am not able to initialize it in the following way. Am I not allowed to initialize a reference in the following way?

class ObjectA
{

private:
    char* _nameA; 
    int _velocityA;

public:
        ObjectA(char* name, int velocity)
        {
            name = name;
            _velocityA = velocity;
        }
};

I get an error in the following initialization list which says a reference of type “ObjectA &” (not const-qualified) cannot be initialized with a value of type “char *” Why exactly am I getting this error? and what am I doing wrong?

class ObjectB
{

private:
    ObjectA& objA;

public:
        ObjectB(char* engName, int _velocityA):objA(engName, _velocityA)
        {
        }
};

Answer 1

The problem is you tried to initialize the reference objA in the same way you create an object.

ObjectB(char* engName, int _velocityA):objA(engName, _velocityA)
    {
    }

Remember objA is a reference, not a pointer or a variable so that objA(engName, _velocityA) would call the constructor of ObjectA.

The constructor of ObjectB should take an ObjectA object as parameter, so that the reference objA can refer.

class ObjectB
{

private:
ObjectA& objA;

public:
    ObjectB(ObjectA & a):objA(a)
    {
    }
};

int main()
{
    ObjectA a("hello", 10);
    ObjectB *b = new ObjectB(a) ;

}