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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
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]
The Boost C++ library provides strong and weak references. It is a mistake to use regular C++ pointers as the weak counterparts of smart pointers because such usage removes the ability to detect when the strong reference count has gone to 0 and the object has been deleted. Worse yet, it does not allow for detection of whether another strong ...
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.
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 ...
A smart pointer typically uses reference counting to reclaim objects. Some other techniques include the tombstones method and the locks-and-keys method. [3] Another approach is to use the Boehm garbage collector, a conservative garbage collector that replaces standard memory allocation functions in C and C++ with a garbage collector. This ...
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++, by contrast, objects are copied automatically whenever a function takes an object argument by value or returns an object by value. Additionally, due to the lack of garbage collection in C++, programs will frequently copy an object whenever the ownership and lifetime of a single shared object would be unclear.