const to Non-const Conversion in C++

I'm really annoyed by const keyword these days, as I'm not quite familiar with it. I had a vector that stores all const pointers like vector<const BoxT<T> *> *Q_exclude, and in the constructor of another class, I need an element in this queue to be passed in as a parameter and assign it to a non-const member. My question is:

How do I assign a const variable to a non-const variable? I know this doesn't make sense because after all, a const is a const, and should not be changed by any mean. But that annoying member variable REALLY has to be changed during the process! I might also change the data type in the vector to b开发者_运维技巧e non-const, but that would be too much work. Or does anyone know how to avoid such situation?

You can assign a const object to a non-const object just fine. Because you're copying and thus creating a new object, constness is not violated.

Like so:

int main() {
   const int a = 3;
   int b = a;
}

It's different if you want to obtain a pointer or reference to the original, const object:

int main() {
   const int a = 3;
   int& b = a;       // or int* b = &a;
}

//  error: invalid initialization of reference of type 'int&' from
//         expression of type 'const int'

You can use const_cast to hack around the type safety if you really must, but recall that you're doing exactly that: getting rid of the type safety. It's still undefined to modify a through b in the below example:

int main() {
   const int a = 3;
   int& b = const_cast<int&>(a);

   b = 3;
}

Although it compiles without errors, anything can happen including opening a black hole or transferring all your hard-earned savings into my bank account.

If you have arrived at what you think is a requirement to do this, I'd urgently revisit your design because something is very wrong with it.

Changing a constant type will lead to an Undefined Behavior.

However, if you have an originally non-const object which is pointed to by a pointer-to-const or referenced by a reference-to-const then you can use const_cast to get rid of that const-ness.

Casting away constness is considered evil and should not be avoided. You should consider changing the type of the pointers you use in vector to non-const if you want to modify the data through it.

The actual code to cast away the const-ness of your pointer would be:

BoxT<T> * nonConstObj = const_cast<BoxT<T> *>(constObj);

But note that this really is cheating. A better solution would either be to figure out why you want to modify a const object, and redesign your code so you don't have to.... or remove the const declaration from your vector, if it turns out you don't really want those items to be read-only after all.

Leaving this here for myself,

If I get this error, I probably used const char* when I should be using char* const.

This makes the pointer constant, and not the contents of the string.

const char* const makes it so the value and the pointer is constant also.

void SomeClass::changeASettingAndCallAFunction() const {
    someSetting = 0; //Can't do this
    someFunctionThatUsesTheSetting();
}

Another solution is to call said function in-between making edits to variables that the const function uses. This idea was what solved my problem being as I was not inclined to change the signature of the function and had to use the "changeASettingAndCallAFunction" method as a mediator:

When you call the function you can first make edits to the setting before the call, or (if you aren't inclined to mess with the invoking place) perhaps call the function where you need the change to the variable to be propagated (like in my case).

void SomeClass::someFunctionThatUsesTheSetting() const {
     //We really don't want to touch this functions implementation
     ClassUsesSetting* classUsesSetting = ClassUsesSetting::PropagateAcrossClass(someSetting);
     /*
         Do important stuff
     */
}

void SomeClass::changeASettingAndCallAFunction() const {
     someFunctionThatUsesTheSetting();
     /*
         Have to do this
     */
}

void SomeClass::nonConstInvoker(){
    someSetting = 0;
    changeASettingAndCallAFunction();
}

Now, when some reference to "someFunctionThatUsesTheSetting" is invoked, it will invoke with the change to someSetting.