I have a question that confuses me. I know what is template and aim of it but I have some blank points on usage.
I have a Template class like that:
template <class elemType>
class SSorting {
public:
int seqSearch(const elemType list[], int length, const elemType& item);
};
When I code the member of a class function seqSearch I need to declare as:
template <class elemType>
int SSorting <elemType> :: seqSearch(const elemType list[], int length, const elemType& item){
*statements*
}
Everything okay at this point. template says this is a function that inside a template class and int in front of the function means that the function will return an integer value, but the part that I don't understand is why we have to write SSorting <elemType> :: seqSearch instead of SSorting :: seqSearch. I already say this is a member of a template class and return type why I we need to say <elemType> again.
You should recall that class/function templates means that for each instantiation with a different template type, the compiler writes down another copy of the code, replacing elemType with the relevant type. Meaning, that if you are using in your code both SSorting<double> and SSorting<int>, you get two totally different types, with different names.
Thus, the name of the class isn't SSorting, but SSorting<elemType>!