C++ return type overload hack

Question

I was bored and came up with such hack (pseudocode):

 1 struct proxy {
 2     operator int(); // int function
 3     operator double(); // double function
 4             


        

Answer 1

I'd rather use template specialization, just feels less "hacky" and probably will be faster (no object creation, although of course that can be optimized away by smart compiler).

But anyway, I'd rather see code like

template T function();

template<> int function() {
    return 1;
}

template<> float function() {
    return 1.0;
}

....
int a = function();
float b = function();

Nothing wrong with your code though, especially if you stay away from numeric types/pointers since otherwise unanticipated effects might occur, rules of conversion is quite complicated in C++.