cout precedence doubt

[lerwys]

Hello.

I was using cout, and something happened that I wasn't expecting.

#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

int returnI();

int i = 0;

int main(void) {

	cout << returnI() << returnI() << returnI();

	return 0;
}

int returnI() {
	i++;
	return i;
}

The output that I was expecting is "123", since the precedence of the << operator is from left to right, but the actual output is "321". Why is this happening?

Thanks in advance.

[Duthomhas]

The order of the function calls is undefined. You are only guaranteed the results are evaluated in a specific order.

BTW, just because you offloaded it into a global variable and a function doesn't mean that you can ignore sequence points. Google around that for more.

Hope this helps.