Question

Is there any way to detect, whether the pointer points to array in C++? My problem is that I want to implement a class, that becomes the owner of the array. My class is initialized with the pointer and I would like to know, whether the pointer is really an array pointer. Here is the simplified code:

class ArrayOwner {
public:
   explicit ArrayOwner( int* initialArray ) : _ptrToArray(initialArray) {}
   virtual ~ArrayOwner() { delete [] _ptrToArray; }
private:
   int* _ptrToArray;
}

• This usage will be ok: ArrayOwner
  foo( new int[10] );
• But this usage
  leads to undefined behaviour:
  ArrayOwner foo( new int() );

I would like to add assert in the constructor, that the “initialArray” pointer is really an array pointer. I cannot change the contract of the constructor, use vectors e.t.c. Is there any way to write this assert in C++?

Answer 1

No, unfortunately not. C++ RTTI does not extend to primitive types.