References in Julia

General Usage
1

Is it possible to change the contents of a vector by means of a pointer? Of course I am aware of the following:

julia> v = zeros(6);

julia> p = v
6-element Array{Float64,1}:
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0

julia> p[1] = 10
10

julia> v
6-element Array{Float64,1}:
 10.0
  0.0
  0.0
  0.0
  0.0
  0.0

But what I want is to point to a different position than the first one. For example, I realized I can do the following, but I do not know if this is the correct approach:

julia> v = zeros(6);
julia> p = Ref(v)
Base.RefValue{Array{Float64,1}}([0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0])
julia> p[][1] = 1
1
julia> p[][6] = 6
6
julia> v
6-element Array{Float64,1}:
 1.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 6.0

Then, what happens if I want to point p to a different position than the first one of v. Is that even possible? In C would be something like:

p = &v[3];
p[2] = 1.0 //changes v

On the other hand, when performing the following instruction

julia> p = v[1:3]
julia> p[1] = 2
2
julia> v
6-element Array{Float64,1}:
 1.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 0.0
 6.0

I am copying v values to a new allocated vector p, right?

1 Like
2

Check out views: Arrays · The Julia Language. The docs were recently updated to add more description, and I think they are what you’re looking for.

4 Likes
3

Yes! It seems that this is what I was looking for. Thanks!

However, if anyone has more ideas please let me know!

1 Like
4

Yeah, a view seems like it does exactly what you want:

julia> v = [1, 2, 3, 4]
4-element Array{Int64,1}:
 1
 2
 3
 4

julia> v_1 = view(v, 1)
0-dimensional view(::Array{Int64,1}, 1) with eltype Int64:
1                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
julia> v_1[] = 10
10                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

julia> v
4-element Array{Int64,1}:
 10
  2
  3
  4
2 Likes