“Variables with static storage duration (3.7.1) or thread storage duration (3.7.2) shall be zero-initialized (8.5)
before any other initialization takes place”.

static ShipType::Format m_format;

to

static Format m_format;

?

In the examples above, the class scope isn’t added when a static variable is declared within the class itself.

That fix may not work, but it’s worth a try.

ShipType::Format m_format = ShipType::verbose;

is correct.

//ShipType.h
class ShipType
{
public:
	enum Type {null, DD, SS, CA, BB, CV};
	enum Format {abbreviated, verbose};
...
	static string toString(ShipType::Type);
...
protected:
	static ShipType::Format m_format;
};

//ShipType.cpp
#include "ShipType.h"
...
ShipType::Format m_format = ShipType::verbose; //Here's where I've instantiated the static

string ShipType::toString(ShipType::Type t)
{
...
  if (ShipType::abbreviated == ShipType::m_format) //error message applies to this LOC
    retVal = shipStringsA[t];
  else
    retVal = shipStringsV[t];
  return retVal;
)//toString

Thank you in advance…

Poke

1. Is static in function variable guaranteed to be initialized (created) at first function call or is it compiler dependent?

as for singletons – it is possible to use static member to create singleton with nice encapsulation but I would rather use static variable in function if answer for my first question is yes.

Since if you will try make some static singleton objects – or some static objects using your singletons then initialisation order of all those global static globals need to be maintained with care.

Since it is possible that you will create a singleton instance before global member was initialised – then initialisation of global member will override previous usage… this seamnot to pose problems used this way in VS2010

Example:

class Singleton
{
public:
  static Singleton & getInstance()
  {
     static Singleton *instance = 0;
     if( ! instance )
     {
        instance = new Singleton();
     }
     return *instance;
  }
};