Standard C++ Library Class Reference

Description

The min_element algorithm returns an iterator that denotes the minimum element in a

sequence. If the sequence contains more than one copy of the minimum element, the iterator

points to the first occurrence of the element. In the second version of the function, the optional

argument comp defines a comparison function that can be used in place of the default

operator<. This function can be used with all the datatypes provided by the standard library.

Algorithm min_element returns the first iterator i in the range [first, last) such that for any

iterator j in the range same range, the following corresponding conditions hold:

!(*j < *i)

comp(*j, *i) == false.

Complexity

min_element performs exactly max((last - first) - 1, 0) applications of the corresponding

comparisons.

Example

// max_elem.cpp

#include <algorithm>

#include <vector>

#include <iostream.h>

int main(void)

{

typedef vector<int>::iterator iterator;

int d1[5] = {1,3,5,32,64};

// set up vector

vector<int> v1(d1,d1 + 5);

// find the largest element in the vector

iterator it1 = max_element(v1.begin(), v1.end());

// it1 = v1.begin() + 4

// find the largest element in the range from

// the beginning of the vector to the 2nd to last

iterator it2 = max_element(v1.begin(), v1.end()-1,

less<int>());

// it2 = v1.begin() + 3