[worstspotgain]

foo(const bar&) is ideal if you precisely wish to bar ownership. If (and in many kinds of projects, invariably it's more like when) you later decide to share ownership, or if nullptr is an option, then it's no good.

foo(std::shared_ptr<bar>) is copy-constructed as part of your function call (bumping the refcount) unless copy elision is both available and allowed. It's only ideal if you almost always pass newly instantiated objects.

Pass by const reference is the sweet spot. If you absolutely must minimize the refcount bumps, overload by const reference and by rvalue.

As for shared_ptrs being very rare, uh, no. We use them by the truckload. To each their own!

[CyberDildonics]

foo(const bar&) is ideal if you precisely wish to bar ownership.

What?

invariably it's more like when) you later decide to share ownership,

shared_ptr shouldn't even be necessary for keeping track of single threaded scope based ownership.

As for shared_ptrs being very rare, uh, no. We use them by the truckload. To each their own!

You might want to look into that, you shouldn't need to count references in single threaded scope based ownership. If you need something to last longer, make it's ownership higher scoped.

If something already works it works, but this is not necessary and is avoiding understanding the actual scope of variables.

[worstspotgain]

> What?

The context you're missing is in your post's GP. That poster holds a std::shared_ptr<bar> (for whatever perfectly valid reason) and wishes to pass it to foo(). However, he declares it as foo(const bar &) because the callee does not need to share in the ownership of the shared_ptr. That means it gets called as foo(*p.get()).

> scope based ownership

That's the incorrect assumption that you came to. Obviously if bar is only used for stack-based scope variables, no shared_ptr is needed.

[CyberDildonics]

The context you're missing is in your post's GP.

I didn't miss any of that, that exactly what I thought it meant. I just don't know what you mean by precisely wish to bar ownership

That's the incorrect assumption that you came to.

Prove it. In a single threaded program with scope based ownership, that shared_ptr is going to be freed somewhere, so why not just have it exist in that scope as a unique_ptr so the ownership scope is clear?

Obviously if bar is only used for stack-based scope variables, no shared_ptr is needed.

Are you saying I'm wrong then saying the exact thing I just said?

[a_t48]

Not sure if this is what GP was getting at, but in games a shared pointer (or similar custom resource handle) to something like a texture can be very useful - you want to share resources between objects in the scene so that you don't load a thing from disk when it's already in memory, but don't want to hold onto it forever to save RAM.

[CyberDildonics]

Very true, and in between threads and in other areas too, but this isn't scope based ownership, it's completely separate from the scope hierarchy of the program.

Scope based ownership would be a unique_ptr that frees the heap memory when it goes out of scope (if it isn't moved).

[worstspotgain]

> I just don't know what you mean by precisely wish to bar ownership

If foo() doesn't need to share ownership now but may need to later, declaring it as foo(const std::shared_ptr<bar> &) instead of foo(const bar &) allows this change without revising any prototypes. However, if we precisely wish to prohibit shared ownership by foo(), we can do so by declaring it as foo(const bar &).

> Prove it. In a single threaded program with scope based ownership

The incorrect assumption that you came to is that we were talking about stack variables. But anyways, here's an example that's both scope-based and single threaded:

   std::vector<std::shared_ptr<bar> > v;

with an algorithm that selectively adds our pointer to the vector one or more times, and another that duplicates and removes elements according to some ongoing criteria. The object gets deleted when no pointer instances are left in the vector.

In practice most code is multithreaded (not that it matters) and most shared_ptrs are held inside other objects (not that it makes a difference either.)

> Are you saying I'm wrong then saying the exact thing I just said?

I'm saying you misunderstood and now I clarified again. I'm at the troll-detection threshold, so this is my last clarification. Take care!

[CyberDildonics]

If foo() doesn't need to share ownership now but may need to later,

This doesn't make sense. Why would a function in a more narrow scope need to take or share ownership? The variable passed will persist before and after the function call.

The incorrect assumption that you came to is that we were talking about stack variables.

I don't know what this means here. I said scope, you are saying stack. If lifetime is being dictated purely by scope, you don't need shared_ptr, you can just use a unique_ptr at the correct scope.

But anyways, here's an example that's both scope-based and single threaded: std::vector<std::shared_ptr<bar> > v;

This isn't scope based lifetime, this is lifetime based on some other criteria than going out of scope. I will show you with what you wrote:

and another that duplicates and removes elements according to some ongoing criteria.