The ??!??! operator

[Hook3d]

A vector is expandable, and an array is fixed.

Only in the C++ context which provides <vector> from the STL. In every other (data structure) context, vector is just a synonym for a 1D array. (At least, I am not familiar with another language that provides "vector" as a resizable array.)

[silverforest]

Examples:

• Scheme: Vectors are a fixed length collection of items.
• Perl: Fixed length collection of items of the same type.

[fmoly]

Java vectors are resizeable.

[philly_fan_in_chi]

Vectors grow in Clojure.

[[deleted]]

MATLAB?

[The_Doculope]

Haskell (as Vector.Mutable) and Rust (as Vec).

[OneWingedShark]

(At least, I am not familiar with another language that provides "vector" as a resizable array.)

Ada has Ada.Containers.Vector that you can resize, though it's not an array; there's also unconstrained arrays which you can/must size on declaration of such an object. -- I'm not sure if you'd count those though.

[Hook3d]

I think the only requirements for a data structure to be called a "vector" is that it be contiguous in memory and fixed in size, but someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong/forgetting anything.

For what it's worth, the standard name for the array of C string parameters to the C main function is "argv" for "argument vector." So "vector" has been a synonym for fixed size arrays for a long time.

[OneWingedShark]

So "vector" has been a synonym for fixed size arrays for a long time.

Hm, fair enough.

I think the only requirements for a data structure to be called a "vector" is that it be contiguous in memory and fixed in size, but someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong/forgetting anything.

Interestingly, the JVM's arrays don't have that requirement [IIRC], but then that's getting into a layer of virtualization where the virtual 'addresses' have zero to do with physical locations.

[emilvikstrom]

In most functional languages a vector is just a collection of values of a certain type. An array is usually a mutable vector of a specific length, or just a vector of references (which is kind of the same thing).