overloading for newbies

Hello. I'm new to C++ but I have some knowledge of C. You may laugh because I don't know what overloading means. I've been doing some reading and I have the vauge idea that overloading means you have two different functions say, but with the same name. Am I in the right direction? Anyway, I need to know how to overload | and & to compute a union of sets and an intersection of sets. Please help.

There is overloading functions and overloading operators. Overloading functions is giving two functions the same name, but having the input parameters be different. For example:

Code:

---

void DisplayData(int integerData)
{
    cout << integerData << endl;
}

void DisplayData(float floatData)
{
    cout << floatData << endl;
}

---

I think what you want is operator overloading. This allows you to give a new definition to an operator (like | or & or * or + or =, etc.) based on what types are used with the operator. Usually, this is used for a specific class. So if you have a class that represents a set, you could overload the operator | to combine two instances of the set. Do you already have a class that represents a set? That would be a good start.

Ok I understand now. Thanks. But how would you go about overloading an operator? Would it be possible for you to give me a short example? Or a link to a good explanation/example?