C++ Bubble sort dynamically allocated array - c++

Question

I wrote a bubble sorting algorithm which sorts a dynamically allocated array using string comparison.
Here is my code:
void AddressBook::bubble_sort_address_book(){
bool swapped = true;
while(swapped){
swapped = false;
for(int i = 0; i < noOfEmployees; i++){
if(employees[i].combined_name() > employees[i+1].combined_name()){
Employee temp_employee = employees[i+1];
employees[i+1] = employees[i];
employees[i] = temp_employee;
}
}
}
}
My problem is pretty obvious, yet I can not seem to figure out how to solve it: The code sometimes fails on the line (in an undefined manner) :
Employee temp_employee = employees[i+1]
Its pretty obvious because if i is equal to the end of the array, accessing memory with i+1 results in undefined behaviour. However, if I stop the for loop with noOfEmployees-1, this does not happen but the first element is never sorted (obviously).
How can I implement bubble sort properly? It seems as such a trivial task. Am I missing something?

Answer 1

The following simplified version in pure C works fine:
int employees[10]= {3,1,7,6,9,7,1,0,2,6};
int noOfEmployees= 10;
void bubble_sort_address_book(void){
bool swapped = true;
int i;
while(swapped){
swapped = false;
for(i = 0; i < noOfEmployees-1; i++){
if(employees[i] > employees[i+1]){
int temp_employee = employees[i+1];
employees[i+1] = employees[i];
employees[i] = temp_employee;
swapped= true;
}
}
}
}
int main()
{
int i;
bubble_sort_address_book();
for (i=0; i<noOfEmployees; i++) {
printf("emp %d= %d\n", i, employees[i]);
}
return 0;
}
As you request, the function of variable swapped is to indicate that following a complete pass through the array no swap occurred and so it indicates the array is now sorted.

Answer 2

You can use an explicit bound on the outer loop.
You should also split things out into smaller functions.
bool operator <(Employee const & lhs, Employee const & rhs) {
return lhs.combined_name() < rhs.combined_name();
}
// a.k.a. std::swap
void swap(Employee & lhs, Employee & rhs) {
Employee temp(static_cast<Employee&&>(lhs)); // a.k.a. std::move
lhs = static_cast<Employee&&>(rhs);
rhs = static_cast<Employee&&>(temp);
}
void bubble_sort_impl(Employee * begin, Employee * end) {
for (; end != begin; --end) {
for (Employee * it = begin; it+1 != end; ++it) {
if (*(it+1) < *it) {
swap(*it, *(it+1));
}
}
}
}
// do we really need "bubble_" or "_address_book" in this name?
void AddressBook::bubble_sort_address_book() {
bubble_sort_impl(employees, employees + noOfEmployees);
}

Answer 3

another solution:
#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
using namespace std;
int employees[10] = { 3,1,7,6,9,7,1,0,2,6 };
void bubble_sort_address_book(void) {
bool swapped = true;
int i;
int noOfEmployees = 10;
while (swapped) {
swapped = false;
for (i = 1; i <= noOfEmployees ; i++) {
if (employees[i] > employees[i - 1]) {
int temp_employee = employees[i - 1];
employees[i - 1] = employees[i];
employees[i] = temp_employee;
swapped = true;
}
}
}
}
int main()
{
int i;
int noOfEmployees = 10;
bubble_sort_address_book();
for (i = 0; i<noOfEmployees; i++) {
printf("emp %d= %d\n", i, employees[i]);
}
return 0;
}