C 11 rvalues and move semantics confusion return statement

Question

I m trying to understand rvalue references and move semantics of C  11  What is the difference between these examples  and which of them is going to do no vector copy  First example std  vector lt int gt  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return tmp     std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector     Second example std  vector lt int gt  amp  amp  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return std  move tmp      std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector     Third example std  vector lt int gt  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return std  move tmp      std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector

User · Answer

None of them will copy  but the second will refer to a destroyed vector  Named rvalue references almost never exist in regular code  You write it just how you would have written a copy in C  03   std  vector lt int gt  return vector         std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return tmp     std  vector lt int gt  rval ref   return vector      Except now  the vector is moved  The user of a class doesn t deal with it s rvalue references in the vast majority of cases

User · Answer

First example std  vector lt int gt  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return tmp     std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector     The first example returns a temporary which is caught by rval ref  That temporary will have its life extended beyond the rval ref definition and you can use it as if you had caught it by value   This is very similar to the following  const std  vector lt int gt  amp  rval ref   return vector     except that in my rewrite you obviously can t use rval ref in a non-const manner  Second example std  vector lt int gt  amp  amp  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return std  move tmp      std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector     In the second example you have created a run time error   rval ref now holds a reference to the destructed tmp inside the function   With any luck  this code would immediately crash  Third example std  vector lt int gt  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return std  move tmp      std  vector lt int gt   amp  amp rval ref   return vector     Your third example is roughly equivalent to your first   The std  move on tmp is unnecessary and can actually be a performance pessimization as it will inhibit return value optimization  The best way to code what you re doing is  Best practice std  vector lt int gt  return vector void        std  vector lt int gt  tmp  1 2 3 4 5       return tmp     std  vector lt int gt  rval ref   return vector     I e  just as you would in C  03   tmp is implicitly treated as an rvalue in the return statement   It will either be returned via return-value-optimization  no copy  no move   or if the compiler decides it can not perform RVO  then it will use vector s move constructor to do the return   Only if RVO is not performed  and if the returned type did not have a move constructor would the copy constructor be used for the return

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The simple answer is you should write code for rvalue references like you would regular references code  and you should treat them the same mentally 99  of the time   This includes all the old rules about returning references  i e  never return a reference to a local variable    Unless you are writing a template container class that needs to take advantage of std  forward and be able to write a generic function that takes either lvalue or rvalue references  this is more or less true   One of the big advantages to the move constructor and move assignment is that if you define them  the compiler can use them in cases were the RVO  return value optimization  and NRVO  named return value optimization  fail to be invoked   This is pretty huge for returning expensive objects like containers  amp  strings by value efficiently from methods   Now where things get interesting with rvalue references  is that you can also use them as arguments to normal functions   This allows you to write containers that have overloads for both const reference  const foo amp  other  and rvalue reference  foo amp  amp  other     Even if the argument is too unwieldy to pass with a mere constructor call it can still be done   std  vector vec  for int x 0  x lt 10    x           automatically uses rvalue reference constructor if available        because MyCheapType is an unamed temporary variable     vec push back MyCheapType 0 f        std  vector vec  for int x 0  x lt 10    x        MyExpensiveType temp 1 0  3 0       temp initSomeOtherFields malloc 5000            old way  passed via const reference  expensive copy     vec push back temp           new way  passed via rvalue reference  cheap move        just don t use temp again   not difficult in a loop like this though           vec push back std  move temp        The STL containers have been updated to have move overloads for nearly anything  hash key and values  vector insertion  etc   and is where you will see them the most   You can also use them to normal functions  and if you only provide an rvalue reference argument you can force the caller to create the object and let the function do the move   This is more of an example than a really good use  but in my rendering library  I have assigned a string to all the loaded resources  so that it is easier to see what each object represents in the debugger   The interface is something like this   TextureHandle CreateTexture int width  int height  ETextureFormat fmt  string amp  amp  friendlyName        std  unique ptr lt TextureObject gt  tex   D3DCreateTexture width  height  fmt       tex- gt friendlyName   std  move friendlyName       return tex      It is a form of a  leaky abstraction  but allows me to take advantage of the fact I had to create the string already most of the time  and avoid making yet another copying of it   This isn t exactly high-performance code but is a good example of the possibilities as people get the hang of this feature   This code actually requires that the variable either be a temporary to the call  or std  move invoked      move from temporary TextureHandle htex   CreateTexture 128  128  A8R8G8B8  string  Checkerboard       or     explicit move  not going to use the variable  str  after the create call  string str  Checkerboard    TextureHandle htex   CreateTexture 128  128  A8R8G8B8  std  move str      or     explicitly make a copy and pass the temporary of the copy down    since we need to use str again for some reason string str  Checkerboard    TextureHandle htex   CreateTexture 128  128  A8R8G8B8  string str      but this won t compile   string str  Checkerboard    TextureHandle htex   CreateTexture 128  128  A8R8G8B8  str

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As already mentioned in comments to the first answer  the return std  move       construct can make a difference in cases other than returning of local variables  Here s a runnable example that documents what happens when you return a member object with and without std  move      include  lt iostream gt   include  lt utility gt   struct A     A     default    A const A amp     std  cout  lt  lt   A copied n       A A amp  amp     std  cout  lt  lt   A moved n         class B     A a   public    operator A   const  amp    std  cout  lt  lt   B C-value     return a      operator A    amp    std  cout  lt  lt   B L-value     return a      operator A    amp  amp    std  cout  lt  lt   B R-value     return a        class C     A a   public    operator A   const  amp    std  cout  lt  lt   C C-value     return std  move a       operator A    amp    std  cout  lt  lt   C L-value     return std  move a       operator A    amp  amp    std  cout  lt  lt   C R-value     return std  move a         int main          Non-constant L-values   B b    C c    A b         B L-value  A copied   A c         C L-value  A moved       R-values   A B         B R-value  A copied   A C         C R-value  A moved       Constant L-values   const B bc    const C cc    A bc        B C-value  A copied   A cc        C C-value  A copied    return 0      Presumably  return std  move some member   only makes sense if you actually want to move the particular class member  e g  in a case where class C represents short-lived adapter objects with the sole purpose of creating instances of struct A   Notice how struct A always gets copied out of class B  even when the class B object is an R-value  This is because the compiler has no way to tell that class B s instance of struct A won t be used any more  In class C  the compiler does have this information from std  move    which is why struct A gets moved  unless the instance of class C is constant

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Not an answer per se  but a guideline  Most of the time there is not much sense in declaring local T amp  amp  variable  as you did with std  vector lt int gt  amp  amp  rval ref   You will still have to std  move   them to use in foo T amp  amp   type methods  There is also the problem that was already mentioned that when you try to return such rval ref from function you will get the standard reference-to-destroyed-temporary-fiasco   Most of the time I would go with following pattern      Declarations A a B amp  amp   C amp  amp    B b    C c     auto ret   a b    c       You don t hold any refs to returned temporary objects  thus you avoid  inexperienced  programmer s error who wish to use a moved object   auto bRet   b    auto cRet   c    auto aRet   a std  move b   std  move c        Either these just fail  assert exception   or you won t get     your expected results due to their clean state  bRet foo    cRet bar      Obviously there are  although rather rare  cases where a function truly returns a T amp  amp  which is a reference to a non-temporary object that you can move into your object   Regarding RVO  these mechanisms generally work and compiler can nicely avoid copying  but in cases where the return path is not obvious  exceptions  if conditionals determining the named object you will return  and probably couple others  rrefs are your saviors  even if potentially more expensive

User · Answer

None of those will do any extra copying   Even if RVO isn t used  the new standard says that move construction is preferred to copy when doing returns I believe   I do believe that your second example causes undefined behavior though because you re returning a reference to a local variable

[c++] C++11 rvalues and move semantics confusion (return statement)

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