/**************************************************************************** ** ** Copyright (C) 2009 Nokia Corporation and/or its subsidiary(-ies). ** Contact: Nokia Corporation (qt-info@nokia.com) ** ** This file is part of the QtCore module of the Qt Toolkit. ** ** $QT_BEGIN_LICENSE:LGPL$ ** No Commercial Usage ** This file contains pre-release code and may not be distributed. ** You may use this file in accordance with the terms and conditions ** contained in the either Technology Preview License Agreement or the ** Beta Release License Agreement. ** ** GNU Lesser General Public License Usage ** Alternatively, this file may be used under the terms of the GNU Lesser ** General Public License version 2.1 as published by the Free Software ** Foundation and appearing in the file LICENSE.LGPL included in the ** packaging of this file. Please review the following information to ** ensure the GNU Lesser General Public License version 2.1 requirements ** will be met: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/lgpl-2.1.html. ** ** In addition, as a special exception, Nokia gives you certain ** additional rights. These rights are described in the Nokia Qt LGPL ** Exception version 1.0, included in the file LGPL_EXCEPTION.txt in this ** package. ** ** GNU General Public License Usage ** Alternatively, this file may be used under the terms of the GNU ** General Public License version 3.0 as published by the Free Software ** Foundation and appearing in the file LICENSE.GPL included in the ** packaging of this file. Please review the following information to ** ensure the GNU General Public License version 3.0 requirements will be ** met: http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html. ** ** If you are unsure which license is appropriate for your use, please ** contact the sales department at http://www.qtsoftware.com/contact. ** $QT_END_LICENSE$ ** ****************************************************************************/ #include "qscopedpointer.h" QT_BEGIN_NAMESPACE /*! \class QScopedPointer \brief The QScopedPointer class stores a pointer to a dynamically allocated object, and deletes it upon destruction. \since 4.6 \reentrant \ingroup misc Managing heap allocated objects manually is hard and error prone, with the common result that code leaks memory and is hard to maintain. QScopedPointer is a small utility class that heavily simplifies this by assigning stack-based memory ownership to heap allocations, more generally called resource acquisition is initialization(RAII). QScopedPointer guarantees that the object pointed to will get deleted when the current scope dissapears. Consider this function which does heap allocations, and have various exit points: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 0 It's encumbered by the manual delete calls. With QScopedPointer, the code can be simplified to: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 1 The code the compiler generates for QScopedPointer is the same as when writing it manually. Code that makes use of \a delete are candidates for QScopedPointer usage (and if not, possibly another type of smart pointer such as QSharedPointer). QScopedPointer intentionally has no copy constructor or assignment operator, such that ownership and lifetime is clearly communicated. The const qualification on a regular C++ pointer can also be expressed with a QScopedPointer: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 2 \section1 Custom cleanup handlers Arrays as well as pointers that have been allocated with \c malloc must not be deleted using \c delete. QScopedPointer's second template parameter can be used for custom cleanup handlers. The following custom cleanup handlers exist: \list \i QScopedPointerDeleter - the default, deletes the pointer using \c delete \i QScopedPointerArrayDeleter - deletes the pointer using \c{delete []}. Use this handler for pointers that were allocated with \c{new []}. \i QScopedPointerPodDeleter - deletes the pointer using \c{free()}. Use this handler for pointers that were allocated with \c{malloc()}. \endlist You can pass your own classes as handlers, provided that they have a public static function \c{void cleanup(T *pointer)}. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 5 \section1 Forward Declared Pointers Classes that are forward declared can be used within QScopedPointer, as long as the destructor of the forward declared class is available whenever a QScopedPointer needs to clean up. Concretely, this means that all classes containing a QScopedPointer that points to a forward declared class must have non-inline constructors, destructors and assignment operators: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 4 Otherwise, the compiler output a warning about not being able to destruct \c MyPrivateClass. \sa QSharedPointer */ /*! \fn QScopedPointer::QScopedPointer(T *p = 0) Constructs this QScopedPointer instance and sets its pointer to \a p. */ /*! \fn QScopedPointer::~QScopedPointer() Destroys this QScopedPointer object. Delete the object its pointer points to. */ /*! \fn T *QScopedPointer::data() const Returns the value of the pointer referenced by this object. QScopedPointer still owns the object pointed to. */ /*! \fn T &QScopedPointer::operator*() const Provides access to the scoped pointer's object. If the contained pointer is \c null, behavior is undefined. \sa isNull() */ /*! \fn T *QScopedPointer::operator->() const Provides access to the scoped pointer's object. If the contained pointer is \c null, behavior is undefined. \sa isNull() */ /*! \fn QScopedPointer::operator bool() const Returns \c true if this object is not \c null. This function is suitable for use in \tt if-constructs, like: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/src_corelib_tools_qscopedpointer.cpp 3 \sa isNull() */ /*! \fn bool QScopedPointer::operator==(const QScopedPointer &other) const Equality operator. Returns true if the scoped pointer \a other is pointing to the same object as this pointer, otherwise returns false. */ /*! \fn bool QScopedPointer::operator!=(const QScopedPointer &other) const Inequality operator. Returns true if the scoped pointer \a other is not pointing to the same object as this pointer, otherwise returns false. */ /*! \fn bool QScopedPointer::isNull() const Returns \c true if this object is holding a pointer that is \c null. */ /*! \fn void QScopedPointer::reset(T *other = 0) Deletes the existing object it is pointing to if any, and sets its pointer to \a other. QScopedPointer now owns \a other and will delete it in its destructor. */ /*! \fn T *QScopedPointer::take() Returns the value of the pointer referenced by this object. The pointer of this QScopedPointer object will be reset to \c null. Callers of this function take ownership of the pointer. */ QT_END_NAMESPACE