C++ Programming/Programming Languages/C++/Code/Keywords/typeid

Syntax typeid( object ); The typeid operator is used to determine the class of an object at runtime. It returns a reference to a std::type_info object, which exists until the end of the program, that describes the "object". If the "object" is a dereferenced null pointer, then the operation will throw a std::bad_typeid exception. Objects of class std::bad_typeid are derived from std::exception, and thrown by typeid and others. The C++98 standard requires that header file <typeinfo> be included before operator typeid is used within a compilation unit. Otherwise, the program is considered ill-formed. The use of typeid is often preferred over dynamic_cast<class_type> in situations where just the class information is needed, because typeid, applied on a type or non de-referenced value is a constant-time procedure, whereas dynamic_cast must traverse the class derivation lattice of its argument at runtime. However, you should never rely on the exact content, like for example returned by std::type_info::name(), as this is implementation specific with respect to the compile. It is generally only useful to use typeid on the dereference of a pointer or reference (i.e. typeid(*ptr) or typeid(ref)) to an object of polymorphic class type (a class with at least one virtual member function). This is because these are the only expressions that are associated with run-time type information. The type of any other expression is statically known at compile time. Example #include <iostream> #include <typeinfo> //for 'typeid' to work class Person { public: // ... Person members ... virtual ~Person() {} }; class Employee : public Person { // ... Employee members ... }; int main () { Person person; Employee employee; Person *ptr = &employee; // The string returned by typeid::name is implementation-defined std::cout << typeid(person).name() << std::endl; // Person (statically known at compile-time) std::cout << typeid(employee).name() << std::endl; // Employee (statically known at compile-time) std::cout << typeid(ptr).name() << std::endl; // Person * (statically known at compile-time) std::cout << typeid(*ptr).name() << std::endl; // Employee (looked up dynamically at run-time // because it is the dereference of a // pointer to a polymorphic class) } Output (exact output varies by system): Person Employee Person* Employee C++ Programming