what's the difference between an explicit conversion and an implicit conversion?
By what means can a class "Support" a direct conversion? Does this mean I couldn't go if(a string==a char*){ , but I could still cast it? or could I cast it?
I think what I'm asking is (I'm just trying to understand how data-types work in C++) if I wrote a class, how would I deal with what it can and can't be converted to?

Also, what does string::c_str() do? Is it just a function that returns a const char*?

Thanks for your help so far btw... I'm starting to understand a lot more about this


oh, what WOULD happen if you casted a float to an int? Just lose the decimal places? Or a signed to unsigned or vice versa?