Thread: #typedef & #define

  1. #1
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    #typedef & #define

    what's the difference?

    --TING

  2. #2
    and the Hat of Guessing tabstop's Avatar
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    Cheap and easy answer: #define exists, #typedef does not.

    Real answer: typedef gives a new name to an existing type, for one reason or another. For example, if you look at cstdint (the header file, or stdint.h), you'll see a bunch of typedef's. The reason being, sometimes people need to know that they're using, say, a 32-bit integer; they can declare their variable as "int_32t" and know that the compiler has typedef'ed that to whatever the appropriate type is (int, or long, or whatever).

    #define is just search-and-replace. Every appearance of the first token is replaced by whatever comes after it. It can do more than just types, but macros and constants. Common usage (in C, not necessarily C++) would be something like
    Code:
    #define MAX_SIZE 80
    to generate a constant.

  3. #3
    Hurry Slowly vart's Avatar
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    #define - is substitution of the string performed by preprocessor
    typedef - alias of the type done by compiler
    All problems in computer science can be solved by another level of indirection,
    except for the problem of too many layers of indirection.
    – David J. Wheeler

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