views:

36

answers:

4

Are there macros or builtins that can return the length of arrays at compile time in GCC?

For example:

int array[10];

For which:

sizeof(array) == 40
???(array) == 10

Update0

I might just point out that doing this in C++ is trivial. One can build a template that returns the number inside []. I was certain that I'd once found a lengthof and dimof macro/builtin in the Visual C++ compiler but cannot find it anymore.

+1  A: 
    sizeof(array) / sizeof(int) 
mobrule
+3  A: 
(sizeof(array)/sizeof(array[0]))

Or as a macro

#define ARRAY_SIZE(foo) (sizeof(foo)/sizeof(foo[0]))

    int array[10];
    printf("%d %d\n", sizeof(array), ARRAY_SIZE(array));

40 10
ndim
Well, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of competition for this one!
Matt Joiner
A: 

im not aware of a builtin that does this, but i recently used:

sizeof(array)/sizeof(array[0])

to do just that

Toddeman
+2  A: 

I wouldn't rely on sizeof since aligment stuff could mess up the thing.

#define COUNT 10
int array[COUNT];

And then you could use COUNT as you want.

tibur
isn't alignment just important for placing the array itself? Inside a c-array, the sizeof-division shall work.
nob
I think you're right: both sizeof will take alignment into consideration. So the sizeof(blah)/sizeof(type) should be safe.
tibur