Re: [Boost-users] Re: shared_ptr, intrusive_ptr ...

From: Peter Dimov (pdimov_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-05-15 06:59:08

Jean-François Brouillet wrote:

> in http://www.boost.org/libs/smart_ptr/smarttests.htm
>
> there's a mention of a "cyclic" smart pointer implementation
> that dealt with cycles "using a dequeue". Is this available
> somewhere (I couldn't locate it in boost 1.32) ?

It is probably referring to Greg Colvin's cyclic_ptr. Just do a Google 
search on cyclic_ptr and you'll be able to find several posts about it. The 
thread starting at:

http://lists.boost.org/MailArchives/boost/msg47966.php

is a good summary (but read the followups as well as this post is not 
entirely correct.)

I have another cycle collector that may be of interest - see the attached 
file for a prototype. It is expensive, though; you should only use 
reset_and_collect in places where cycles are known to occur. Best if you can 
avoid cycles entirely (which might be difficult in a Java port). ;-)