Programming question of the week ;)

[Mikael Hansson]

Suppose you have this:

class Item {
protected:
   string title;
public:
   Item(string t) : title(t) {}
};

class Cd : public Item {
private:
   string artist;
public:
   Cd(string a, string t) : Item(t), artist(a) {}
   void setArtist(string a) {artist = a}
};


int main()
{
   Cd *cd1 = new Cd("Music-barr", "Shelter");

   vector<Item*> vec;
   vec.push_back(cd1);

   vec[0]->setArtist("Music-bar");
}


That last line is the problem since the CD* becomes a Item* once it is 
stored in the vector and hence the setArtist function isn't recognized.
How do you solve this? It doesn't make sense to do virtual functions in 
class Item for every possible set-get function in the children classes.

Totally wrong approach?

/Micke