C++ requires constant expressions — expressions that evaluate to a constant — for declarations of:
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Array bounds
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Selectors in case statements
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Bit-field length specification
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Enumeration initializers
The only operands that are legal in constant expressions are:
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Literals
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Enumeration constants
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Values declared as const that are initialized with constant expressions
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sizeof expressions
Nonintegral constants must be converted (either explicitly or implicitly) to integral types to be legal in a constant expression. Therefore, the following code is legal:
const double Size = 11.0;
char chArray[(int)Size];
From: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/3ffb821x.aspx
So we don't need to have constant expression when initialize a const variable:
int i = -1;
const int ic = i; //legal.