Overloading operator += for linked list in c++

Question

I have an assignment to overload operator += so it adds new data to the list. List += data should therefore mean list=list+data, which is logically similar to what operator += does with basic types like int etc. I suck at linked lists, I've just figured out how to do it with functions, so I have no idea what to do in this case.

List& List::operator+=(const T& newData)
    {
        last_ = (!first_ ? first_ : last_->next_) = new Elem(newData);
        ++listSize_;
        return *this;
    };

where T is from template <typenameT> class List {...} "

Is this okay, I mean can I use code from function

List& addToList (const T& newData) {same code snippet}

, will it give me expected results? I don't think so, because it never uses operator itself in the code and that kinda confuses me.

As it's obvious I'm a beginner in coding, sorry for my bad cpp :)

Typically you should include a class template's argument list with the class name. That way the code would be more self-documenting, and you wouldn't have to give us the comment. — Spencer
– Spencer, Commented Dec 27, 2019 at 0:00

Slava · Accepted Answer · 2019-12-26 23:48:37Z

2

If you define operator+= for your class, calling it on instance of your class:

yourlist += somedata;

would be equal to call to any other method:

yourlist.operator+=( somedata );

it is just a syntactic sugar. So as you can see this is pretty much the same as any other member function (except it allows you to call it a special way). So implementing operator+= with a call of method addToList() or vice versa is perfectly fine.

answered Dec 26, 2019 at 23:48

Slava

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