Line 19 creates an ostream_iterator
that’s capable of inserting (outputting) int
values in the standard output object cout
. Line 22 outputs an integer to cout
by assigning to *outputInt
the sum of number1
and number2
. Notice that we use the dereferenced outputInt
iterator as an lvalue in the assignment statement. If you want to output another value using outputInt
, the iterator must be incremented with ++
first. Either the prefix or postfix increment can be used—we use the prefix form for performance reasons because it does not create a temporary object.
Error-Prevention Tip 15.2
The * (dereferencing) operator when applied to a const iterator returns a reference to const for the container element, disallowing the use of non-const member functions.