When I do this:
std::vector<int> hello;
Everything works great. However, when I make it a vector instead:
std::vector<int &> hello;
I get horrible errors like "error C2528: 'pointer' : pointer to reference is illegal".
I want to put a bunch of references to structs into a vector, so that I don't have to meddle with pointers. Why is vector throwing a tantrum about this? Is my only option to use a vector of pointers instead?
You have to settle with pointers. As the compiler error says, internally, vector will want to have a variable of type T* which won't work if T is a reference.
It's a flaw in the C++ language. You can't take the address of a reference, since attempting to do so would result in the address of the object being referred to, and thus you can never get a pointer to a reference. std::vector works with pointers to its elements, so the values being stored need to be able to be pointed to. You'll have to use pointers instead.
By their very nature, reference can only be set at the time they are created, i.e. the following two lines have very different affects:
int & A = B; // makes A an alias for B
A = C; // assigns value of C to B.
Futher, this is illegal.
int & D; // must be set to a int variable.
However, when you create a vector, there is no way to assign values to it's items at creation. You are essentially just making a whole bunch of the last example.
The component type of containers like vectors must be assignable. References are not assignable (you can only initialize them once when they are declared, and you cannot make them reference something else later). Other non-assignable types are also not allowed as components of containers, e.g. vector<const int> is not allowed.
boost::ptr_vector<int> will work.
Edit: was a suggestion to use std::vector< boost::ref<int> >, which will not work because you can't default-construct a boost::ref.
As other have mentioned, you will probably end up using a vector of pointers instead.
However, you may want to consider using a ptr_vector instead!