default implementation of assignment operator

Hello everyone,


I am wondering the default implementation of assignment operator (e.g. when we do not implement assignment operator in user defined class, what will be returned? temporary object? reference or const reference? deep copy or shallow copy is used in default assignment operator?)? I have the C++ Programming Book at hand, but can not find it from Index page.


thanks in advance,
George

It's mainly necessary when your object contains pointers, since you probably want to create a copy of the object being pointed to, not just the pointer.

I think (not positive) that it works like:

Code:

---

MyClass MyClass::operator = (const MyClass& right)
{
    value1 = right.value1;
    value2 = right.value2;
    value3 = right.value3;
    // etc...
    return this;
}

---

That may not be totally correct but I think I got the main idea.

The compiler generated assignment operator for a class invokes the assignment operators of any base classes, and then does a member-wise copy of any non-static data members specific to the class. The return value is a reference to the object that is being assigned (effectively a reference to *this). This allows chaining of assignments (eg a = b = c = d;).

The behaviour described is modified in some circumstances (eg by attributes of or existence of assignment operators for base classes or data members). For example, if a base class has a private assignment operator, it cannot be called (implicitly or explicitly) in the content of a derived class.