Like this? class C : public boost::noncopyable { public: ... clone() const { ... } private: C( const C& rhs ) { .... } }; ... instance c1 of C exists here .... What possible return types of clone() const are possible? .A native reference .An auto_ptr To be honest, I'm not sure myself of how it would be used... Regards, -----Original Message----- From: boost-users-bounces@lists.boost.org [mailto:boost-users-bounces@lists.boost.org] On Behalf Of Steven Watanabe Sent: 04 December 2008 16:28 To: boost-users@lists.boost.org Subject: Re: [Boost-users] noncopyable AMDG Hicham Mouline wrote:
AFAIU, deriving from boost::noncopyable disables _accidental_ object copying.
Is it possible to implement a clone() const member function of the object to _explicitly_ get a copy of the object?
Perhaps deriving boost::noncopyable makes it totally impossible to ever get a copy of an object without resorting to byte copy.
boost::noncopyable has a private copy constructor and copy assignment operator. This prevents the compiler from generating a copy constructor and assignment operator for derived classes. That's all noncopyable does. If you want a clone function, the easiest way is probably to implement a private copy constructor and have clone call it. In Christ, Steven Watanabe