Re: Defect Report: istreambuf_iterator should have an operator->()

From:
"Greg Herlihy" <greghe@pacbell.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.std.c++
Date:
Mon, 26 Mar 2007 11:52:47 CST
Message-ID:
<1174926798.703182.67920@o5g2000hsb.googlegroups.com>
On Mar 26, 7:40 am, "James Kanze" <james.ka...@gmail.com> wrote:

On Mar 26, 1:40 am, nore...@this.is.invalid (Niels Dekker - no return
address) wrote:

Based on Greg's example, the following code demonstrates the issue:
  #include <iostream>
  #include <fstream>
  #include <streambuf>
  typedef char C;
  int main ()
  {
    std::ifstream s("filename", std::ios::in);
    std::istreambuf_iterator<char> i(s);
    (*i).~C(); // This is well-formed...


Well formed, perhaps, but it looks like undefined behavior at
execution. (Maybe not in the case of char; char's rather
special in this regard. But definitily in the case of other
types.)


There would no point in allowing pseudo-destructor calls in C++ unless
such calls had well-defined behavior. Otherwise, the Standard would
simply be trading a compilation error for undefined behavior - which
would not be a sensible trade. So we can be assured that a psuedo-
destructor call for any scalar type is well-defined - and, in fact, it
is:

"The use of a pseudo-destructor-name after a dot . or arrow ->
operator represents the destructor for the non-class type named by
type-name. The result shall only be used as the operand for the
function call operator (), and the result of such a call has type
void. The only effect is the evaluation of the postfix-expression
before the dot or arrow." [?5.2.4/2]

Greg

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