Re: reference lifetimes...

From:
Victor Bazarov <v.Abazarov@comAcast.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++
Date:
Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:31:05 -0500
Message-ID:
<hdf3dn$u2g$1@news.datemas.de>
James Kanze wrote:

On Nov 11, 1:26 pm, Victor Bazarov <v.Abaza...@comAcast.net> wrote:

James wrote:

Here is my code:

#include <iostream>

struct foo
{
   foo()
   {
       std::cout << this
                 << "->foo::foo()"
                 << std::endl;
   }

   ~foo()
   {
       std::cout << this
                 << "->foo::~foo()"
                 << std::endl;
   }
};

struct foo_holder
{
   foo const& m_ref;
};

int main()
{
   {
       foo_holder fh = { foo() };
       std::cout << "okay" << std::endl;
   }

   std::cout << std::endl;

   {
       foo const& ref = foo();
       std::cout << "okay" << std::endl;
   }

   return 0;
}

Why does the const reference not properly maintain its
lifetime over the call to 'cout' when the reference is
contained within a POD 'foo_holder'? I get the following
output:

0x22ff50->foo::foo()
0x22ff50->foo::~foo()
okay

0x22ff50->foo::foo()
okay
0x22ff50->foo::~foo()

Something seems terribly wrong here... Is there anyway to
overcome this?


The form

     T t = { blah };

is copy-initialisation.


But not of T. In his case, he copy initializes the member m_ref
of foo_holder with a temporary.


I think you're contradicting yourself here. If 'T' is an aggregate, and
the form

     T t = { <initialiser list> };

does not perform copy-initialisation (from some temporary aggregate into
the 't' object), then there is no copy-initialisation of member 'm_ref'
anywhere, it's direct initialisation of the reference with a temporary,
which we know as "binding to a temporary".

The compiler is free to create another temporary (of your
class 'foo_holder') before initializing 'fh' with it, which
makes the temporary's 'm_ref' member bound to the temporary
'foo'.


I don't see anything in the standard which says that. He's
using aggregate initialization, which means that he's providing
a list of expressions to initialize each of the elements of the
aggregate. In his case, foo() is the expression which
initializes the foo_holder::m_ref, and not the foo_holder
itself. And the distinction between copy initialization and
direct initialization doesn't apply to either references or
aggregate initialization. (If you'll look at the points in
?8.5/14, you'll see that the standard sends you to another
section for both aggregate initialization and reference
initialization, before considering whether it is copy
initialization or not.) The compiler can still make a copy (at
least at present), but then it is the copy which is bound to the
reference, and whose lifetime is extended. (And of course, if
the compiler did make a copy, we'd see two calls to the
destructor each time.)


Not a copy of 'foo', a copy of 'foo_holder', which has no destructor,
but it's irrelevant. It's possible that GC++ creators followed the same
faulty logic I did, and came to the conclusion that they need to create
a temporary of type 'foo_holder', which then allowed destruction of the
temporary 'foo'.

The 'foo_holder' temporary is destroyed after initialising of
the 'fh' variable, causing the destruction of your foo'
temporary.


There is no foo_holder temporary.


Well, how do you know that the compiler doesn't create it? Unless the
OP looks at the generated assembly code, there is no way to tell, is
there? I mean, in real life. Perhaps you're saying that the Standard
requires that there shan't be any copies of 'foo_holder' objects created
during initialisation (brace-enclosed), IOW copying is prohibited. Then
you're right and the GC++ has a bug.

V
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