On 10/6/07, Vladimir Batov <batov@people.net.au> wrote:
Mathias,
Here is a simple deep-copying smart pointer. ... That is nothing compared to the massive overhead of using shared_ptr.
Well, I feel that "the massive overhead" is debatable. If you refer to implementation complexity, it's there for a reason and is not an issue as it's already there. If you refer to perfomance, then it's not a clear cut as it very much depends on an application and the usage pattern.
When it comes to performance, I think the key thing to understand about shared_ptr is that copying them or having copies go out of scope are the expensive operations. If you're just holding shared_ptrs to manage object lifetime you're fine. But if you start passing them around all over the place and making lots of short-lived copies, this is where you might run into trouble. -- Caleb Epstein