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In the C++ programming language, the assignment operator, =, is the operator used for assignment.Like most other operators in C++, it can be overloaded.. The copy assignment operator, often just called the "assignment operator", is a special case of assignment operator where the source (right-hand side) and destination (left-hand side) are of the same class type.
If a destructor is declared generation of a copy constructor is deprecated (C++11, proposal N3242 [2]). Move constructor if no copy constructor, copy assignment operator, move assignment operator and destructor are explicitly declared. Copy assignment operator if no move constructor and move assignment operator are explicitly declared.
Copy assignment operator – assign all the object's members from the corresponding members of the assignment operator's argument, calling the copy assignment operators of the object's class-type members, and doing a plain assignment of all non-class type (e.g. int or pointer) data members.
In C++, objects are created on the stack when the constructor is invoked without the new operator, and created on the heap when the constructor is invoked with the new operator. Stack objects are deleted implicitly when they go out of scope, while heap objects must be deleted implicitly by a destructor or explicitly by using the delete operator.
The copy constructor is used only for initializations, and does not apply to assignments where the assignment operator is used instead. The implicit copy constructor of a class calls base copy constructors and copies its members by means appropriate to their type. If it is a class type, the copy constructor is called. If it is a scalar type ...
C++ objects in general behave like primitive types, so to copy a C++ object one could use the '=' (assignment) operator. There is a default assignment operator provided for all classes, but its effect may be altered through the use of operator overloading. There are dangers when using this technique (see slicing).
C++ also defines several global operators (such as operator new) that work on all classes, which the programmer can override. However, there is very little control over creating these defaults. Making a class inherently non-copyable, for example, may be done by declaring a private copy constructor and copy assignment operator and not defining them.
Consider the Standard Library requirements. From a standard library perspective, a class T with a copy assignment operator whose return type is "reference to const T" can not even be considered an Assignable type. Consider also that the implicitly generated assignment operator for a class returns "reference to T".