What is the difference between C++ character arrays and strings?

In C++, character arrays and strings are two different concepts.

1. A character array is a collection of consecutive character elements, with a null character (‘\0’) serving as the ending marker. Character arrays can be declared and defined using either a character pointer or a character array, for example:

char array1[10]; // 声明了一个包含10个字符元素的字符数组
char* array2;    // 声明了一个字符型指针

1. A string is a sequence made up of characters, represented by the string class in the C++ standard library. String objects can dynamically allocate and manage memory, and provide many methods for manipulating strings such as concatenation, searching, and replacing. String objects can be initialized using the assignment operator or constructor.

std::string str1 = "Hello"; // 使用赋值运算符初始化字符串对象
std::string str2("World");  // 使用构造函数初始化字符串对象

In terms of functionality and ease of use, string objects are more flexible and convenient, as they provide many methods for manipulating strings, whereas character arrays require manual handling of string operations. Additionally, string objects offer overloaded operators (such as +, ==, <, etc.) and numerous member functions (such as length(), substr(), find(), etc.), making string manipulation simpler and more efficient. In contrast, character arrays require the use of C language string functions for operations, such as strlen(), strcpy(), strcat(), etc.

In conclusion, while a character array is a simple collection of characters, a string is a class provided by the C++ standard library that offers more functionality and convenience.