Is there any diffrence between {} or default in initializing constructor

Question

Is there any difference (no matter how tiny is) between those three methods of defaulting the constructor of a class:

Directly in the header using {}:

//foo.h
class foo{
public:
    foo(){}
}

Directly in the header using default keyword:

//foo.h
class foo{
public:
   foo()=default;
}

In the cpp using {}

//foo.h
class foo{
public:
   foo();
}

//foo.cpp
#include "foo.h"
foo::foo(){}

TartanLlama · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-08 11:11:27Z

6

Yes, there is a difference.

Option 1 and 3 are user-provided. A user-provided constructor is non-trivial, making the class itself non-trivial. This has a few effects on how the class can be handled. It is no longer trivially copyable, so cannot be copied using memcpy and the like. It is also not an aggregate, so cannot be initialized using aggregate-initialization

A fourth option is the following:

//foo.h
class foo{
public:
   foo();
}

//foo.cpp
#include "foo.h"
foo::foo()=default;

Although this may seem analogous to your second example, this is actually user-provided as well.

Functionally, the defaulted constructor does the same thing as your foo(){}, as specified in [class.ctor]/6.

answered Feb 8, 2016 at 11:11

TartanLlama

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2 Comments

Humam Helfawi Over a year ago

Thanks...May I extend my question a bit and ask why (or when) should I make it trivial or non-trivial ?

TartanLlama Over a year ago

Choosing to make your class trivial or non-aggregate probably doesn't buy you much unless you really don't want users treating it as such.

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