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[10] C++ provides low-level features which Java mostly lacks (one notable exception being the sun.misc.Unsafe API for direct memory access and manipulation). In C++, pointers can be used to manipulate specific memory locations, a task necessary for writing low-level operating system components. Similarly, many C++ compilers support an inline ...
Since C++11, the C++ standard library also provides smart pointers (unique_ptr, shared_ptr and weak_ptr) which can be used in some situations as a safer alternative to primitive C pointers. C++ also supports another form of reference, quite different from a pointer, called simply a reference or reference type.
Smart pointers typically keep track of the memory they point to, and may also be used to manage other resources, such as network connections and file handles. Smart pointers were first popularized in the programming language C++ during the first half of the 1990s as rebuttal to criticisms of C++'s lack of automatic garbage collection. [1] [2]
Among more structured solutions, a popular technique to avoid dangling pointers in C++ is to use smart pointers. A smart pointer typically uses reference counting to reclaim objects. Some other techniques include the tombstones method and the locks-and-keys method. [3]
The outer variable "owns" the reference. In the programming language C++, this technique is readily implemented and demonstrated with the use of const references. Reference counting in C++ is usually implemented using "smart pointers" [18] whose constructors, destructors, and assignment operators manage the references. A smart pointer can be ...
Objects that are shared but not owned can be accessed via a reference, raw pointer, or iterator (a conceptual generalisation of pointers). However, by the same token, C++ provides native ways for users to opt-into such functionality: C++11 provides reference counted smart pointers, via the std::shared_ptr class, enabling automatic shared memory ...
In C++, a smart pointer can be used to automate reference count management. The following are guidelines for when to AddRef and Release should called: A functions that returns an interface reference (via return value or via "out" parameter) increments the count of the returned object
C++ began as a fork of an early, pre-standardized C, and was designed to be mostly source-and-link compatible with C compilers of the time. [1] [2] Due to this, development tools for the two languages (such as IDEs and compilers) are often integrated into a single product, with the programmer able to specify C or C++ as their source language.