Class Pointers

Pointer arithmetic is not applicable to class pointers, therefore, class pointer validity can be ensured by performing a null-check.

Jancy provides built-in support for a special kind of class pointers: “weak”. These pointers don’t affect the lifetime of an object. Obviously, weak class pointers cannot be used to access an object they point to and can only be cast to strong pointers. If this cast operation returns non-null value, the result can be used to access the object normally; otherwise, the object has already been destroyed.

class C1 {
    //...
}

void foo() {
    C1* c = new C1;
    C1 weak* w = c;

    // if we lose a strong pointer before GC run, the object will be collected

    std.collectGarbage();

    c = w; // try to restore strong pointer

    if (c) {
        // the object is still alive
    }
}