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©Copyright 1999 Rogue Wave Software

Bidirectional Iterators


     Iterator

Summary

An iterator that can both read and write and can traverse a container in both directions

Contents

Description


For a complete discussion of iterators, see the Iterators section of this reference.


Iterators are a generalization of pointers that allow a C++ program to uniformly interact with different data structures. Bidirectional iterators can move both forwards and backwards through a container, and have the ability to both read and write data. These iterators satisfy the requirements listed below.

Key to Iterator Requirements

The following key pertains to the iterator descriptions listed below:

a and b values of type X
n value of distance type
u, Distance, tmp and m identifiers
r value of type X&
t value of type T

Requirements for Bidirectional Iterators

A bidirectional iterator must meet all the requirements listed below. Note that most of these requirements are also the requirements for forward iterators.

X u u might have a singular value
X() X() might be singular
X(a) copy constructor, a == X(a).
X u(a) copy constructor, u == a
X u = a assignment, u == a
a == b, a != b return value convertable to bool
a->m equivalent to (*a).m
*a return value convertable to T&
++r returns X&
r++ return value convertable to const X&
*r++ returns T&
--r returns X&
r-- return value convertable to const X&
*r-- returns T&

Like forward iterators, bidirectional iterators have the condition that a == b implies *a== *b.

There are no restrictions on the number of passes an algorithm may make through the structure.

See Also

Containers, Iterators


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