Re: Smart pointers was RE: [GD-General] Compile times

[Jesse J. <jes...@mi...>]

At 11:42 AM -0500 12/16/02, Thatcher Ulrich wrote:
>On Dec 16, 2002 at 04:05 -0800, Jesse Jones wrote:
>>  At 8:16 PM -0600 12/15/02, brian hook wrote:
>>  >Assuming that we're defining "smart pointer" as ref-counted,
>>  >templatized pointer access, then here are the typical bugaboos:
>
>[snip]
>
>>  Well, what are the options?
>
>Brian and Ignacio mentioned handles.  It seems to me that handles are
>equivalent to smart pointers, with a few differences in details.  The
>similarities:
>
>* If your handle manager keeps a ref-count (or something similar) to
>   avoid deleting an object that has an active handle, then handles
>   essentially behave like ref-counted smart pointers.
>
>* If your handle manager is allowed to delete objects when it feels
>   like it, then handles are essentially the same as weak pointers,
>   with a strong pointer in the handle manager.

This seems right to me and handles seem like a good option if you 
don't have enough memory to hold all of your objects and you can 
re-construct them from a resource file or some sort of save file.

   -- Jesse