vector<...>.....What is it?

I have seen stuff like this:

vector<int>

and stuff like that. What is it and what does it do. I know a lot of C++ and I have some experience w/ OpenGL and SDL, but I never used this stuff before. Any answers?

>I know a lot of C++

No you don't, try a decent C++ book. std::vector is part of the C++ standard template library, and is intended to replace the need to hand code an efficient generic dynamic array.

That is a vector class that uses templates. The templates allow the vector to be of any data type. You can look up info about the STL on google.com. As well you can d/l the current version of the STL from that site.

the stl is newer (i think) than a lot of c++

anyway... here's an example:

PHP Code:

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vector<vector <int> > array; // array of array of ints
vector <int> x;
x.push_back(3);
x.push_back(5); //x[0]=3, x[1]=5
x.push_back(7);
array.push_back(x); //neat, huh? 


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that's a small segment. the stl can sort it, swap two values, reverse (i think), and may other things. all of the above can be done on the whole list or just a small section

As with what ygf showed, a vector < vector <int> > can be made into a non-square matrix.