Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Chapter 3
Constructors & Destructors
-by-
Prof. Bhandare P. S.
SVERI’s COE(Poly), Pandharpur

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Syllabus:
 3.1 Concepts of Constructors, Types of constructors: Default,
Parameterized, Copy.

 3.2 Overloaded Constructors: Multiple Constructors in a Class,

Constructors with default arguments.

 3.3 Destructors.

Assignment No 3.
 List four types of constructors. (2M)
 Write example code of constructor with default argument (example code
of constructor, only, not whole program). (2M)
 Explain concept of overloaded constructor in a class with example. (4M)
 Differentiate between constructor and destructor. (4M)
 What is overloaded constructor in a class? Explain with example. (4M)
 State any four characteristics of constructor. (4M)
 Explain the concept of parameterized constructor with example. (4M)
 Explain copy constructor with example. (4M)
 Write any four rules to define constructor in a class. (4M)
 What is destructor ? Give it’s syntax. How many destructors can be
defined in a single class ? (4M)
 Declare a class simple interest having data members as principle amount,
rate of interest, no. of years. The constructor will have default value of
interest as 11.5%. Accept this data for two objects. Calculate and display
simple interest for each object.
 Write a program to declare a class time having data member as hrs, min,
sec. Write a constructor to accept data and use display function for two
objects.
 Define a class distance having data members as feet and inches. Write
default as well as parameterized constructor and accept data for 2 objects.
Display the accepted data.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

About title of chapter :

 The title of chapter Constructor & destructor gives idea about the new
concept defined in C++.

 In this chapter we will get information defining constructors &

destructors.

 In this chapter students are going to learn new programming approach.

Central Idea of chapter

 Central Idea behind including this chapter in subject is that the student
will importance of constructor & destructor for the classes in OOP.

 Also Student will learn how programming can be organized in C++

language with the help of constructors & destructors.

Importance of chapter :

 Studying this chapter is important is because this chapter introduce new

concept in OOP language.

 Also this chapter include defining constructors & destructors.

 Also it will include different types of constructors.

Objectives of the chapter

 To study concepts of constructors & destructors.

 To study constructor definition & calling.

 To study types of constructors.

 To study overloaded constructors, multiple constructors.

 To study destructors.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Introduction
 We have seen, examples of classes being implemented.

 In all the cases, we have used member functions such as putdata() and
setvalue() to provide initial values to the private member variables.

◦ E.g.

◦ A.input();

 invokes the member function input, which assigns the initial values to the
data items of object A.

 Similarly, the statement

◦ x.getdata(100,299.95);

 passes the initial values as arguments to the function getdata(), where

these values are assigned to the private variables of object x.

 All these 'function call' statements are used with the appropriate objects
that have already been created.

 These functions cannot be used to initialize the member variables at the

time of creation of their objects.

 C++ provides a special member function called the constructor which

enables an object to initialize itself when it is created.

 This is known as automatic initialization of objects.

 It also provides another member function called the destructor that

destroys the objects when they are no longer required.

Constructor
 A constructor is a 'special' member function whose task is to initialize the
objects of its class.

 It is special because its name is the same as the class name.

 The constructor is invoked whenever an object of its associated class is

created.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

It is called constructor because it constructs the values of data members of the

class.

 A constructor is declared and defined as follows:

 When a class contains a constructor like the one defined above, it is

guaranteed that an object created by the class will be initialized
automatically.

◦ E.g.

◦ integer Intl; // object Intl created

 not only creates the object Intl of type integer but also initializes its data
members m and n to zero.

 There is no need to write any statement to invoke the constructor function

(as we do with the normal member functions).

 If a 'normal' member function is defined for zero initialization, we would

need to invoke this function for each of the objects separately.

 This would be very inconvenient, if there are a large number of objects.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

 A constructor that accepts no parameters is called the default constructor.

 The default constructor for class A is A::A( )

 If no such constructor is defined, then the compiler supplies a default

constructor. Therefore a statement such as

◦ A a;

◦ invokes the default constructor of the compiler to create the object

a.

The constructor functions have some special characteristics.

 They should be declared in the public section.

 They are invoked automatically when the objects are created.

 They do not have return types, not even void and therefore, and they
cannot return values.

 They cannot be inherited, though a derived class can call the base class
construction.

 Like other C++ functions, they can have default arguments.

 Constructors cannot be virtual.

 We cannot refer to their addresses.

 An object with a constructor (or destructor) cannot be used as a member

of a union.

 They make 'implicit calls' to the operators new and delete when memory
allocation is required.

 Remember, when a constructor is declared for a class, initialization of the

class objects becomes mandatory.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Parameterized Constructors
 The constructor integer(), defined above, initializes the data members of
all the objects to zero.

 However, in practice it may be necessary to initialize the various data

elements of different objects with different values when they are created.

 C++ permits us to achieve this objective by passing arguments to the

constructor function when the objects are created.

 The constructors that can take arguments are called parameterized

constructors.

 The constructor integer() may be modified to take arguments as shown

below:

class integer
{
int m, n;
public:
integer(int x, int y); // parameterized constructor
………….
………….
};
integer :: integer(int x, int y)
{
m=x ;
n= y;
}

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

 When a constructor has been parameterized, the object declaration

statement such as integer intl;
 may not work, We must pass the initial values as arguments to the
constructor function when an object is declared.
 This can be done in two ways:
◦ By calling the constructor explicitly.
◦ By calling the constructor implicitly.
 The following declaration illustrates the first method:
 integer Intl = integer(0,100); //explicit cull
 This statement creates an integer object Intl and passes the values 0 and
100 to it.
 The second is implemented as follows:
 integer int1(0,100); // implicit call
 This method, sometimes called the shorthand method, is used very often
as it is shorter, looks better and is easy to implement.
 Remember, when the constructor is parameterized, we must provide
appropriate arguments for the constructor.

The constructor functions can also be defined as inline functions.

Example:
class integer
{
int m, n;
public:
integer(int x, int y) // Inline constructor {
m = x; y = n;
................
…………
} };

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

The parameters of a constructor can be of any type except that of the

class to which it belongs.
For example,

◦ class A

◦ {

◦ public:

◦ A(A);

◦ }

◦ is illegal.

However, a constructor can accept a reference to its own class as a

parameter. Thus, the statement
◦ class A

◦ {

◦ public:

◦ A (A & ) ;

◦ };

◦ is valid. In such cases, the constructor is called the copy

constructor.

Constructor with default argument:

 However, the statement ABC a1(2.0, 3.0); assigns 2.0 to a and 3.0 to b.

 The actual parameter, when specified, overrides the default value.

 As pointed out earlier, the missing arguments must be the trailing ones.

 It is important to distinguish between the default constructor A::A() and the

default argument constructor A::A(int a=0) .

 The default argument constructor can be called with either one argument or no
arguments.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

 When called with no arguments, it becomes a default constructor.

 When both these forms are used in a class, it causes ambiguity for a statement
such as
 A a;
 The ambiguity is whether to 'call' A::A() or A::A(int = 0).

Copy Constructor
 A copy constructor is used to declare and initialize an object from another
object.
 For example, the statement
 Integer i2(i1);
 would define the object i2 and at the same time initialize it to the values of i1.
 Another form of this statement is integer
 i2 = i1;
 The process of initializing through a copy constructor is known as copy
initialization.
 A copy constructor takes a reference to an object of the same class as itself as
an argument

Destructors
 A destructor, as the name implies, is used to destroy the objects that have been
created by a constructor.
 Like a constructor, the destructor is a member function whose name is the same
as the class name but is preceded by a tilde.
 For example, the destructor for the class integer can be defined as shown
below:
 ~ integer(){ }
 A destructor never takes any argument nor does it return any value.
 It will be invoked implicitly by the compiler upon exit from the program for
block or function as the case may be to clean up storage that is no longer
accessible.
 It is a good practice to declare destructors in a program since it releases
memory space for future use.
 Whenever new is used to allocate memory in the constructors, we should use
delete to free that memory.

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Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Winter-15
 List four types of constructors. (2M)
 Write example code of constructor with default argument (example code of
constructor, only, not whole program). (2M)
 Explain concept of overloaded constructor in a class with example.(4M)
 Differentiate between constructor and destructor. (4M)
 State any four characteristics of constructor. (4M)

Summer-15
 Define constructor. State any two type of constructor. 2m
 Define constructor overloading. 2m
 Explain the concept of destructor in a class with example. (4M)
 Explain any two types of constructor with syntax and example. (4M)
 Explain the concept of parameterized constructor with example. (4M)
 Explain the concept of parameterized constructor with example. (4M)
 Explain copy constructor with example. (4M)

Winter-14
 What is copy constructor ? 2M
 Write any four rules to define constructor in a class. 4M
 What is destructor ? Give it’s syntax. How many destructors can be defined in a
single class ? 4M
 Explain constructor with default argument. 4M
 Explain overloaded constructor in a class with suitable example. 4M

Summer-14
 State the characteristics of destructor. 2M
 What is parameterized constructor? Give the syntax & example of it. 4M
 Illustrate the concept of constructor with default argument with suitable
example. 4M
 State any four characteristics of constructor. 4M
 Explain the concept of overloaded constructors in a class with suitable example.
4M
11
Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)
 Name of staff:- Prof. Bhandare P.S.

Winter-13
 What is a parameterized constructor used in C++ ? 2M
 Describe the importance of destructors. 2M
 What is default constructor ? 2M
 What is meant by constructor overloading ? Explain the concept with proper
example. 4M

12
Subject: Object oriented programming (17432)