It might seem naive to ask how to loop through a C++ vector using index. However, it is not: even experienced programmer may write buggy code to loop through a vector.

I have long been familiar with code snippet below:

vector<int> arr(100, 0);
for (int i = 0; i != arr.size(); ++i){
    // do something with arr[i]
}

Each time I write code like this, the compiler gives me warnings:

comparison between signed and unsigned integer expressions [-Wsign-compare]

The reason is simple: arr.size() has type vector<int>::size_type, which is unsigned. We are comparing signed types (int) with unsigned types (vector<int>::size_type), hence the warning. If you insist on using int as index for vector types, you are for some buggy code. The better way is to use unsigned type as index for vector, but we need to be careful.

Choosing the index type: size_t or size_type?

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Theoretically, we should declare the type of index i to be vector<int>::size_type. But it is a lot of code to type. So I prefer to use size_t as the type of index, which is also an unsigned type. Most of the time, you can safely use size_t as the index. If you are interested, you can check the difference between size_type and size_t here.

How to loop forward

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Looping forward through a vector using index is straightforward. See the sample code below:

vector<int> arr(100, 0);
for (size_t i = 0; i != arr.size(); ++i){
    // do something with arr[i]
}

How to loop backward

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The pitfall

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Looping backward through a vector when you declare the index as unsigned type has pitfalls that we should avoid. Unfortunately, I have fallen into this trap several times. Consider the following code:

for (size_t i = arr.size()-1; i >= 0; --i){
    // do something with arr[i]
}

This code has a serious bug: because i is unsigned type, so i will never be smaller than 0, as a result, the for loop never stops.

The correct way

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There are two ways to loop backward correctly, the first one is:

for (size_t i = arr.size()-1; i != (size_t)-1; --i){
    // do something with arr[i]
}

Because i is unsigned type, when i equals 0, i-1 will become (size_t)-1, which is the largest value that size_t can represent. Then the loop will stop correctly.

The second one is:

for (size_t i = arr.size(); i-- > 0; ){
    // do something with arr[i]
}

When i equals 0, the condition i-- > 0 will not be met, so the loop will terminate.

Ok, that is all I want to write in this post. Hope it can help you.

References

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• Loop backward, second way.
• Loop forward.(There are discussions why you should not ignore warnings about comparison between signed and unsigned type)
• Possible danger of using unsigned index in C++.
• Another discussion about the pitfalls.
• Unsigned type, useful but tricky.
• How to loop forward and backward for a vector.
• How to find the maximum value of size_t.