C++ concepts: Iterator

 

C++

Language

Standard library headers

Concepts

Utilities library

Strings library

Containers library

Algorithms library

Iterators library

Numerics library

Input/output library

Localizations library

Regular expressions library (C++11)

Atomic operations library (C++11)

Thread support library (C++11)

Technical Specifications

 

C++ concepts

Basic
DefaultConstructible CopyAssignable CopyConstructible	MoveAssignable (C++11) MoveConstructible (C++11) Destructible
Layout
TrivialType (C++11) TriviallyCopyable (C++11)	StandardLayoutType (C++11) PODType
Library-Wide
EqualityComparable LessThanComparable Swappable (C++11) ValueSwappable (C++11)	NullablePointer (C++11) Hash (C++11) Allocator
Container
Container SequenceContainer ContiguousContainer (C++17) ReversibleContainer	AssociativeContainer AllocatorAwareContainer UnorderedAssociativeContainer (C++11)
Container Elements
DefaultInsertable (C++11) CopyInsertable (C++11) MoveInsertable (C++11)	EmplaceConstructible (C++11) Erasable (C++11)
Iterator
Iterator OutputIterator InputIterator	ForwardIterator BidirectionalIterator RandomAccessIterator ContiguousIterator (C++17)
Stream I/O
FormattedInputFunction UnformattedInputFunction	FormattedOutputFunction UnformattedOutputFunction
Random Numbers
SeedSequence (C++11) RandomNumberEngine (C++11)	RandomNumberDistribution (C++11) UniformRandomNumberGenerator (C++11) RandomNumberEngineAdaptor (C++11)
Concurrency
BasicLockable (C++11) Lockable (C++11) TimedLockable (C++11)	Mutex (C++11) TimedMutex (C++11) SharedMutex (C++17) SharedTimedMutex (C++14)
Other
CharTraits pos_type off_type Clock (C++11) BitmaskType	UnaryTypeTrait (C++11) BinaryTypeTrait (C++11) TransformationTrait (C++11) TrivialClock (C++11) LiteralType (C++11)

 

The Iterator concept describes types that can be used to identify and traverse the elements of a container.

Iterator is the base concept used by other iterator types: InputIterator, OutputIterator, ForwardIterator, BidirectionalIterator, and RandomAccessIterator. Iterators can be thought of as an abstraction of pointers.

Requirements

The type It satisfies Iterator if

• The type It satisfies CopyConstructible, and
• The type It satisfies CopyAssignable, and
• The type It satisfies Destructible, and
• lvalues of type It satisfy Swappable, and

Given

• r, an lvalue of type It,
• reference, the type denoted by std::iterator_traits<It>::reference

The following expressions must be valid and have their specified effects:

Expression	Return Type	Precondition
*r	unspecified	r is dereferenceable (see below)
++r	It&	r is incrementable (see below)

Dereferenceable iterators

Iterators for which the behavior of the expression *i is defined are called dereferenceable.

Iterators are not dereferenceable if

• they are past-the-end iterators (including pointers past the end of an array) or before-begin iterators. Such iterators may be dereferenceable in a particular implementation, but the library never assumes that they are.
• they are singular iterators, that is, iterators that are not associated with any sequence. A null pointer, as well as a default-constructed pointer (holding an indeterminate value) is singular
• they were invalidated by one of the iterator-invalidating operations on the sequence to which they refer.

Iterators for which the behavior of the expression ++i is defined are called incrementable.

See also

• Iterator library