Passing object into array that are of the same parent class

Question

As I am still somewhat new to programming in C++ I was just curious if it were possible to pass objects pointers to an array in order for code consolidation.

Header file like such;

class.h

class parent
{
    some information.....
};

class child1 : public parent
{
    some information.....
};

class child2 : public parent
{
    some information.....
};

Main file like such;

main.cpp

#include "class.h"

int main()
{
    child1 instanceChild1;
    child2 instanceChild2;

    child1* pointer1 = &instanceChild1;
    child2* pointer2 = &instanceChild2;

    parent array[2] = {pointer1 , pointer2};
}

I am trying to achieve such so that I may create a function that uses a dynamic array in order to hold object pointers so that I may dereference them in the function and manipulate them accordingly. Though I am having issues getting the different pointers to work together when going into an array. I need such functionality since there will be many different objects(all under the same parent) going in and out of this function.

Answer 1

Yes it is possible. But you need to declare the array like this

parent * arr[] = { ... }

or it would be better if you use a vector

vector<parent *> arr;
arr.push_back(childPointer);//For inserting elements

as @pstrjds and @basile has written and if you want to use child specific member functions, you can use dynamic cast

ChildType1* ptr = dynamic_cast<ChildType1*>(arr.pop());
if(ptr != 0) {
   // Casting was succesfull !!! now you can use child specific methods
   ptr->doSomething();
}
else //try casting to another child class

** your compiler should support RTTI in order for this to work correctly

you can see this answer for details

I prefer to use pure Virtual functions like this

class A {   
        public :
        enum TYPES{ one , two ,three };
        virtual int getType() = 0;
    };
class B : public A{
public:
    int getType()
    {
        return two;
    }
};
class C : public A
{
    public:
    int getType()
    {
       return three;
    }
};