Question

I’m having an issue where using vector.push_back(value) is overwriting the final value, rather than appending to the end. Why might this happen? I have a sample item in the vector, so it’s size never hits zero. Below is the code..

void UpdateTable(vector<MyStruct> *Individuals, MyStruct entry)
{
    MyStruct someEntry;
    bool isNewEntry = true;

    for (int i = 0; i < Individuals->size(); i++)
    {
        if (!(strcmp(Individuals->at(i).sourceAddress, entry.sourceAddress)))
        {
            isNewEntry = false;
            //snip.  some work done here.
        }
    }

    if(isNewEntry)
    {
        Individuals->push_back(entry);
    }
}

This let’s my first “sample” value stay in, and will allow for just one more item in the vector. When 2 new entries are added, the second overwrites the first, so the size is never larger than 2.

edit: More code, since this is apparently not the issue?

void *TableManagement(void *arg)
{
      //NDP table to store discovered devices.
      //Filled with a row of sample data.
      vector<MyStruct> discoveryTable;
      MyStruct sample;
      sample.sourceAddress = "Sample";
      sample.lastSeen = -1;
      sample.beaconReceived = 1;
      discoveryTable.push_back(sample);

      srand(time(NULL));
      while(1)
      {
          int sleepTime = rand() % 3;
          sleep(sleepTime);
          MyStruct newDiscovery = ReceivedValue();
          if (newDiscovery.lastSeen != -1000) //no new value from receivedValue()
          {
              UpdateTable(&discoveryTable, newDiscovery);
          }
          printTable(&discoveryTable);
      }
      return NULL;
}

Answer 1

I’m going to hazard a guess:

Suppose MyStruct is declared like

struct MyStruct
{
    const char *sourceAddress;
    // Other Gubbins ...
};

And that ReceivedValue does something like

MyStruct ReceivedValue()
{
    static char nameBuffer[MAX_NAME_LEN];

    // Do some work to get the value, put the name in the buffer

    MyStruct s;
    s.sourceAddress = nameBuffer;
    // Fill out the rest of MyStruct
    return s;
}

Now, every structure you push into your vector has sourceAddress pointing to the same global buffer, every time you call ReceivedValue it overwrites that buffer with the new string – so every entry in your vector ends up with the same string.

I can’t be sure without seeing the rest of your code, but I can be sure that if you follow some of the good C++ style suggestions in the comments to your question this possiblity would go away.

Edit for clarification: there’s no need to heap allocate your structures, simply declaring sourceAddress as a std::string would be sufficient to eliminate this possibility.