Subj : Re: vectors
To   : borland.public.cpp.borlandcpp
From : maeder
Date : Wed Jul 28 2004 12:04 am

"mike" <localmotion@hawaii.rr.com> writes:

> class A
> {
>   public:
>     vector<Person*>& getPeople ();
>
>   private:
>     vector<Person*>people_;
> }
>
> the getPeople() just returns people_, however i wanted to know if this was
> correct. if i return a reference to people_ it is much less overhead then
> returning the entire vector. however when the A object is deleted (when i
> create it i do A *a = new A ()), is the memory deallocated?

Evaluating the delete expression

delete a;

will invoke the destructor of class A on *a. This is a compiler-generated
destructor, since you don't provide it yourself, which is ok. This destructor
will invoke the vector<Person*> destructor on a->people_.



> if so, it's probably just coincidence that my program works.

That depends on what your program does.


> i guess the only other alternative is to return a copy of the entire vector?

I don't have enough information to answer this.

.