What is the current point to empty/null associative arrays?

[Cooler]

On Friday, 29 November 2013 at 09:51:07 UTC, Peter Alexander
wrote:
> On Friday, 29 November 2013 at 09:39:57 UTC, Cooler wrote:
>> On Friday, 29 November 2013 at 08:48:03 UTC, Chris Cain wrote:
>>> On Friday, 29 November 2013 at 08:32:12 UTC, Cooler wrote:
>>>> ...
>>>
>>> Try making fill array look more like this:
>>>
>>> void fillArray(ref string[int] a) { a[10] = "A"; }
>>>
>>> The issue is that an array (and/or associative array) is a 
>>> value type. Basically, you can look at it as a struct with a 
>>> pointer (and some extra info). If you don't pass it as a ref 
>>> then reallocations (such as what happens when you add an item 
>>> to an empty AA) will cause the two to not point to the same 
>>> information anymore.
>>
>> Adding "ref" is not an exit. I show this example only for 
>> simplicity. In my real example I have to fill different AA 
>> base on condition:
>>  string[int] aa1, aa2;
>>  ...
>>  auto aaToFill = someCheck ? aa1 : aa2;
>>  // Then do something with aaToFill
>>
>> If aa1 is empty it will never be filled.
>
> string[int]* aaToFill = someCheck ? &aa1 : &aa2;
> (*aaToFill)["A"] = 1;

You are right! But looks like a hack. If it will be something
like empty initilizer [:], it will be better.