[boost] Re: scoped_ptr rationale

From: David B. Held (dheld_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-09-23 14:11:11

"Howard Hinnant" <hinnant_at_[hidden]> wrote in message
news:705AEC29-CDC0-11D6-9E79-003065D18932_at_twcny.rr.com...
> [...]
> As for applications, I'm having a hard time believing that a scoped_ptr
> that only served the "current scope" intention would be useless.  I
> agree that it might not be as widely used as a smart pointer capable of
> resource transfer, but I'm not convinced that it would be useless.
> [...]

It's not useless at all.  For the three or four people in the world that use
the VCL, scope-limited smart pointers with no resource transfer are
very useful.  That's because VCL objects can only be created on the
heap (because they're really Delphi objects, but that's another story).
A basic (VCL) example:

int foo(std::string const& name)
{
    boost::scoped_ptr<TRegistry> reg(new TRegistry);

    return reg->ReadInteger(name.c_str());
}

Dave