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Smart pointers

What problem do smart pointers solve?

They are pointers, but they are smart because they handle the allocation and deallocation of the underlying heap memory they point to.

unique_ptr

• Owns the resources exclusively
• Cannot be copied
• Deals with non-copy objects

shared_ptr

• Shares a resource
• Reference counter to the shared resources
• Deletes the resource if the reference counter becomes 0

weak_ptr

• Borrows the resource
• Helps break cyclic references
• Doesn’t change the reference standard

Performance

Concurrency

Function Arguments and Return Values