structure or class?

[hannes]

can someone tell me the difference between a structure and a class?

[garob]

In C++ the only difference as far as I know is that with a class member variables are private by default and with a structure they are public by default.

[jsmith]

Also, if unspecified, inheritance in classes private by default and in structs is public by default.

[hannes]

there have to be more differences than that?

[jsmith]

No.

EDIT: Ok, there used to be more differences, if you are using a really, really, really old compiler. So old that it's not even worth mentioning what the differences were, as it will just confuse rather than clarify.

[mcleano]

Structs can only hold data members if programming in C I believe.

[jsmith]

The keyword "class" does not exist in C.

[seymore15074]

Unless I'm mistaken there is also a way to initialize a struct with a special syntax, similar to how you can initialize an array, that will not work on a class.

EDIT: both classes and structs did work for this with gcc. (I probably forgot to make the members public before trying it with a class)

[jsmith]

This compiles fine for me:

class foo {
   public:
       int x;
       float f;
       char c;
};

int main() {
   foo f[] = { { 1, 3.13, 'c' }, { 2, 3.14, 'd' } };
}

[borekiller]

If I am not mistaken you can't declare functions in a struct, while you can in a class; which is a pretty big difference.

[screw]

In C you can't put functions into the struct but in C++ you can!

http://carcino.gen.nz/tech/cpp/struct_vs_class.php