Basic Typedef question

Whats the difference between doing:

Code:

typedef struct myStruct {

      int a;
      int b;
};

and

Code:

typedef struct {
      int a;
      int b;
} myStruct;

They both seem to do the same thing and produce the same results:

Code:

myStruct ms;
ms.a = 3;
ms.b = 4;

You don't need the typedef in the first case there.
Yes they are the same but the first one without the typedef is the preferred way in C++.

You should be getting a warning for the first version. It doesn't actually typedef anything. If you replace the struct {} part with a simpler type, say "int," it would look like:

Code:

typedef int;

Which is meaningless, and I'm surprised it does compile at all (it does compile though, at least with VC9)