Re: reference to non-const temporary

From:
"Greg Herlihy" <greghe@pacbell.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.std.c++
Date:
Wed, 26 Jul 2006 17:49:53 CST
Message-ID:
<1153952900.417540.126880@b28g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>
Ethan Eade wrote:

Consider the following: The failures apply to g++ 3.3.3 and 3.4, but
not 4.01, which happily compiles when line '***' is not present. Should
it always work according to the standard?

//-------------------------------------------------
struct Foo {
     void foo() {}
     operator Foo& () { return *this; } // ***
};

Foo make() { return Foo(); }

void use(Foo& foo) {}

int main()
{
     // This line always works
     make().foo();

     // This line fails when *** is commented out
     // using g++ 3.3.3 and 3.4
     use(make());
}


The compiler should ignore the operator Foo&() conversion method when
converting a Foo to a Foo&, so whether the method is commented in or
out should make no difference to the compiler. Since a temporary cannot
be passed as a non-const reference parameter, the use() function call
should not compile successfully in both cases. (?12.3.2/1 prohibits a
conversion method from being called to convert an object to a reference
to the object's type.)

Greg

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