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sabgenton

8:00 AM

I don't know if this is the right room but

is int a; a =5; an assignment or initialization

int a = 5 is obviously initialization but I am unsure about the above

user2334

@sabgenton int a; a = 5; is two separate statements: the first is a declaration, the second is an initialization.

sabgenton

@Mark ok so you don't call the second statment assignment?

assignment involves a destructor I understand

user2334

@sabgenton Depends on the language and who you're talking to, but I wouldn't call it an assignment because a hasn't been initialized yet. Assignment requires destroying the old value and replacing it with a new one

user2334

Some people define initialization as the first assignment though

sabgenton

yeah na forget them

@MarkTrapp I thought it would be destroying an old value

say garbage

if it was in a function

(c/c++)

user2334

8:11 AM

In C/C++, as far as I understand both, assignment and initialization are two different things and that would definitely not be an assignment. In GC languages like Java or PHP or whatever, there's very little difference between the two.

sabgenton

GC?

user2334

garbage collected

sabgenton

ah see

didn't know php was GC :)

user2334

Yeah, using reference counting

sabgenton

@MarkTrapp thanks for the help :)

user2334

8:20 AM

de nada

user2334

@sabgenton Actually, looking around to confirm what I've been telling you, I don't know what I'm talking about. You might want to ask real experts who do instead, like in the C++ room.

sabgenton

yeah was looking my self

check this out

a constant can only be initialized

@MarkTrapp I don't have 20 reputation at stack :(

user2334

Ah I see

user2334

Well, it looks like it was asked and answered on Stack Overflow anyway:

user2334

Q: Initialisation and assignment

What EXACTLY is the difference between INITIALIZATION and ASSIGNMENT ? PS : If possible please give examples in C and C++ , specifically . Actually , I was confused by these statements ... C++ provides another way of initializing member variables that allows us to initialize member variabl...