Troubling with sizeof char within structy

[vetyst]

Hello,

i've been strugling with an troublesome compiler bug i think.

for the following code you would expect the total struct size to be 5 however that is not the case.

struct tagTest
{
char a; // 1 byte large
int b; // 4 bytes large
}

Somehow when i debug my program and ask for the sizeof(tagTest) the size was transformed into 8 bytes.

so i tried to see what was wrong and come to the conclusion that when a char is declared before any other type than char it automaticly takes over the size of the type in memory.

I'm using microsoft visual studio 2012.

I am wondering if its compiler side or just a rule within c++ and how i can solve this to be how it should be.


thanks in advance

[bufige]

This is explained at the links below.


http://www.c-faq.com/struct/align.html
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3486854/size-of-structure-with-a-char-a-double-an-int-and-a-t

[vetyst]

Thanks, knowing what to look for really saved my day.

Solution;
In microsoft visual studio 2012

Project Properties -> Configuration -> C/C++ -> Code Generation _> Struct Member Alignment

Set it to the prefered alignment size.