c++ - Why vector<bool>::reference doesn't return reference to bool?

Question

#include <vector>

struct A
{
    void foo(){}
};

template< typename T >
void callIfToggled( bool v1, bool &v2, T & t )
{
    if ( v1 != v2 )
    {
        v2 = v1;
        t.foo();
    }
}

int main()
{
    std::vector< bool > v= { false, true, false };

    const bool f = false;
    A a;

    callIfToggled( f, v[0], a );
    callIfToggled( f, v[1], a );
    callIfToggled( f, v[2], a );
}

The compilation of the example above produces next error :

dk2.cpp: In function 'int main()':
dk2.cpp:29:28: error: no matching function for call to 'callIfToggled(const bool&, std::vector<bool>::reference, A&)'
dk2.cpp:29:28: note: candidate is:
dk2.cpp:13:6: note: template<class T> void callIfToggled(bool, bool&, T&)

I compiled using g++ (version 4.6.1) like this :

g++ -O3 -std=c++0x -Wall -Wextra -pedantic dk2.cpp

The question is why this happens? Is vector<bool>::reference not bool&? Or is it a compiler's bug?
Or, am I trying something stupid? :)

Answer 1

Vector is specialized for bool.

It is considered a mistake of the std. Use vector<char> instead:

template<typename t>
struct foo {
  using type = t;
};
template<>
struct foo<bool> {
  using type = char;
};

template<typename t, typename... p>
using fixed_vector = std::vector<typename foo<t>::type, p...>;

---

Occasionally you may need references to a bool contained inside the vector. Unfortunately, using vector<char> can only give you references to chars. If you really need bool&, check out the Boost Containers library. It has an unspecialized version of vector<bool>.