max of empty IntegerVector gives large negative number

[jackwasey]

Not sure if this is designed to be somewhat consistent with R (which gives -Inf and a warning for max(integer(0)).

Rcpp::cppFunction('int getiv() { IntegerVector IV = IntegerVector::create(); return max(IV); }')
getiv()
# [1] -368909088

Don't know where the number came from, other than perhaps a random memory location on my machine. If it is picking random memory locations, I guess it could cause some kind of memory access violation? I don't see an obviously correct choice of output in this case.

[eddelbuettel]

Agreed -- max() and min() do not seem to check correctly for empty vectors right now, and the returned value appears to be a random value each time.

edd@rob:~/git/rcpp(master)$ Rscript -e 'Rcpp::cppFunction("int getiv() { IntegerVector IV = IntegerVector::create(); return max(IV); }"); getiv()'
[1] 955757120
edd@rob:~/git/rcpp(master)$ Rscript -e 'Rcpp::cppFunction("int getiv() { IntegerVector IV = IntegerVector::create(); return max(IV); }"); getiv()'
[1] -376245696
edd@rob:~/git/rcpp(master)$