Why is my smart contract constructor not called automatically when it is deployed? - ethereum

Question

When I deploy the below smart contract, the variable manager has the address 0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000. It is only after I call the constructor (Lottery()) that the variable manager has an address that matches the account it is deployed by.
Why is my constructor not called automatically?
pragma solidity ^0.4.17;
contract Lottery {
address public manager;
function Lottery() public {
manager = msg.sender;
}
}

Answer 1

Your constructor should be called automatically.
I used Remix (https://remix.ethereum.org) with compiler version 0.4.17 and then deployed and manager was set to the deployment address as expected.
The issue you are experiencing would happen if the contract name and the constructor had different names, so the function was no longer a constructor.
Solidity 0.4.22 changed to use constructor instead of the contract name to avoid these type of bugs:
https://github.com/ethereum/solidity/releases/tag/v0.4.22
Constructors should now be defined using constructor(uint arg1, uint arg2) { ... } to make them stand out and avoid bugs when contracts are renamed but not their constructors.
I would suggest you look at using a later version of Solidity 0.5.x.