Default Parameters in C++ Functions

We've seen how function overloading gives the user several functions with the same name that (persumably) perform the same (or similar) task with different data types.

A similar, but different, idea is to provide a single function that can be called with a different number of parameters.

Consider the function InitArray( ) below that initializes the given array of integers to the user-specified value.

void InitArray (int array[], int size, int value) { for (int i = 0; i < size; i++) array[i] = value; } which might be used in the code below void InitArray( int array[], int size, int value); int main ( ) { int a[10], b[20], c[5]; InitArray (a, 10, 0); InitArray (b, 20, 0); InitArray (c, 5, -1); // the rest of main here } In most of our experience, we use arrays of integers as counters or sums and would like them to be intialized to zero. We can define InitArray( ) above to use zero as the default argument value of the parameter named "value" by a minor change to the function's prototype void InitArray( int array[], int size, int value = 0); The code in main( ) above still works exactly as written, but could also be written as int main ( ) { int a[10], b[20], c[5]; InitArray (a, 10); InitArray (b, 20); InitArray (c, 5, -1); // the rest of main here } Note that the first two calls to InitArray( ) have just two parameters, whereas the last call has three parameters.

Rules for default arguments:

  1. The default argument value is given in the function prototype, not in the function definition
  2. There may be more than one default argument, but all default argument positions must be in the rightmost positions. This is illustrated in Display 4.8 (pg 160 of the text) which is shown below.
  3. Default arguments can only be use with call-by-value parameters. (They make no sense for call-by-reference parameters).
Note also, that anything you can do with default arguments can also be done with function overloading. As an exercise, consider how you would use function overloading in the InitArray() example above.

Display 4.8 from the text (below) shows a function showVolume() with two default argument values. Note that showVolume() can be called in three different ways. When showVolume() is called with missing arguments, the missing arguments are assumed to be the right most arguments.

//--------------------------------- // File: 04-08.cpp // Date: 8/20/03 // Author: D. Frey // Section: n/a // EMail: frey@cs.umbc.edu // // This is a modified version of example 04-08 // from the text, page 160 which is an example // of using default parameters //--------------------------------------------------- #include <iostream> using namespace std; // prototypes for functions in this file void ShowVolume(int length, int width = 1, int height = 1); int main( ) { ShowVolume( 4, 6, 2 ); ShowVolume( 4, 6 ); ShowVolume( 4 ); return 0; } //------------------------------------------- // ShowVolume ( ) // PreConditions: // params should all be nonnegative // PostConditions // Returns the volume of a box. // If no height is given, the height is assumed to be 1. // If neither height nor width are given, both are assumed to be 1. //--------------------------------------------- void ShowVolume(int length, int width, int height) { cout << "Volume of a box with \n" << "Length = " << length << ", Width = " << width << endl << "and Height = " << height << " is " << length * width * height << endl; }


Last Modified: Monday, 28-Aug-2006 10:15:59 EDT