Casting custom shared_ptr object

Question

I am using custom shared_ptr class for some program on Arduino, and I need to do something like this:

shared_ptr<Base_class> b_ptr;
shared_ptr<Child_class> ptr((shared_ptr<Child_class>) b_ptr);

In my shared_ptr class I have three constructors:

shared_ptr() : pData(0), reference(0){...}
shared_ptr(T* pValue) : pData(pValue), reference(0){...}
shared_ptr(const shared_ptr<T>& sp) : pData(sp.pData), reference(sp.reference){...}

and some other stuff... For casting I tried to write the following:

 template< typename T2 >
operator T2 * () const
{
 return (T2 *)pData;
}

and:

 template< typename T2 >
operator shared_ptr<T2> () const
{
 shared_ptr<T2> temp((T2 *)pData);
 return temp;
}

but can't get it to work.

• ratchet freak: why do you need a shared ptr in the first place? there's not a lot of memory to warrant dynamic allocation for objects in the first place...
• KIIV: It's better not to use C-style casting in C++. It's working for POD types, but it's basically saying this pointer to elephant is now pointer to train. You should learn about static_cast and dynamic_cast (but I'd skip reinterpret_cast as it's roughly equivalent to the C-style casting)

Answer 1

For doing:

shared_ptr<Base_class> b_ptr;
shared_ptr<Child_class> ptr(b_ptr);

you have to use another constructor. If you take a look on this Example of shared_ptr implementation, you can see:

template<class U> shared_ptr(const shared_ptr<U>& s) ...

That's exactly the constructor, that takes shared_ptr of different type .

And similarly for assigment operator.

• Mykolas: Thankyou for you answer. But how will I initialize private data like: pData(s.pData), reference(s.reference)? I can't access them directly, since now they are other class members.
• KIIV: I don't know much about your shared_ptr class. Anyways, you can assign pointer to the child into pointer to the parent directly (by implicit conversion).
• Mykolas: I got it working by making template a friend of sared_ptr class. Thankyou for your help
• KIIV: @Mykolas Btw, if the reference is class member, it'll never work. You have to use something common for all copies.
• Mykolas: Yes, I know. The reference is a separate class. Each shared_ptr object stores a pointer to this related reference object. Thankyou for the comment. @KIIV