C++ Primer, Fifth Edition

Determining the Candidate and Viable Functions

The first step of function matching identifies the set of overloaded functions considered for the call. The functions in this set are the candidate functions. A candidate function is a function with the same name as the called function and for which a declaration is visible at the point of the call. In this example, there are four candidate functions named f.

The second step selects from the set of candidate functions those functions that can be called with the arguments in the given call. The selected functions are the viable functions. To be viable, a function must have the same number of parameters as there are arguments in the call, and the type of each argument must match—or be convertible to—the ...