Question

I have a class:

class A
{
private:
ComplexClass member1;

public:
getMember1(){return member1;};
};

and I have an implementation that, for code simplification (more easily understandable), needs to retrieve that member1 to work with it. The first thing that would come to my mind would be:

ComplexClass *myComplexClass = &getMember1();

myComplexClass.getSomething();
myComplexClass.getSomethingElse();
etc.

which is obviously not correct since I’m retrieving a pointer from a new object and not from member1 (and gets a compiler warning).

My question is: what is the best design to do things like this? How do I keep encapsulation and yet facilitate the access of a members using a pointer to it? (I only want to read from member1, not to write on it).

Should I make a

ComplexClass *getPointerToMember1()

inside the class A?

Answer 1

A const reference will keep them from editing. In my opinion, it makes your intention clearer than a const pointer.

class A
{
private:
ComplexClass member1;

public:
const ComplexClass &getMember1(){return member1;};
};