Re: Returning Refs

From:
"Victor Bazarov" <v.Abazarov@comAcast.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++
Date:
Sat, 31 Mar 2007 10:40:53 -0400
Message-ID:
<krmdnVj_lOR075PbnZ2dnUVZ_sWdnZ2d@comcast.com>
EvilOldGit@googlemail.com wrote:

const Thing &operator++(int)
{
Thing temp = *this;
operator++();
return temp;
}
Is this code robust ?


Not only it's not robust, it has undefined behaviour if the caller
of this function tries to use the reference returned.

I get a compiler warning about returning a reference to a a local,
which I guess is because the compiler doesn't tell the difference
between this overload any any other function.


Huh?

Thing x,y;
x = y++;
Is OK because it's thrown away, and it's a copy of non-incremented y
that gets assigned.


Huh? No. It's not OK because by the time you try _using_ the return
value from the operator++(int) the local object has been destroyed
already.

y++ = x;
Does things to my head, but can't happen because I'm returning a
const.


Not sure what you mean by "can't happen". The compiler should
flag that as an error since you try assigning to a const object.

const_casting<> doesn't


Huh?

But could a (creatively stupid) user of my code do some harm ?


C++ is not fool-proof or malice-proof. Almost any program in C++
can be used in a way that would do some harm.

V
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