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Is RAII even wanted? I mean, in the name, 'Resource acquisition is initialization' it talks about the initialization part. But while not super versed in cpp, it

by Xeamek 2y ago

Is RAII even wanted? I mean, in the name, 'Resource acquisition is initialization' it talks about the initialization part. But while not super versed in cpp, it looks like what everybody wants is actually the de-initialization part, which doesn't seem to be inherent to RAII, no? It's a bit confusing to have a 'thing' mention one mechanism in its name, but actually being valuable by ensuring some other mechanism

legobmw99 2y ago
I feel like most RAII fans will openly admit that it’s the worst name in the world for such an idea. The idea is that any time you acquire a resource, you should initialize an object with said resource. But I guess “resource allocation should always lead to object initialization” is too long. The reason to do this is precisely so that the resource can be cleaned up at destruction of the object. So even if you had an acronym like RASALTOI, it would still probably be misleading
NekkoDroid 2y ago
RAII is the worst name they could have selected and C++ devs openly admit that. Its more SBRM, Scope Based Resource Management.
susam 2y ago
> It's a bit confusing to have a 'thing' mention one mechanism in its name, but actually being valuable by ensuring some other mechanism. Indeed! When I was first learning C++, I found the term "RAII" quite confusing too. However, after years of experience with this term, associating "RAII" with its intended meaning has become second nature. Having said that, there is at least one way to make better sense of "RAII" and that is considering the fact that in RAII, holding a resource is a class invariant. The resource is acquired during construction (initialisation) and released during destruction (which happens automatically when the object of the class goes out of scope). Throughout the object's lifetime, from construction to destruction, maintaining possession of the acquired resource is an invariant condition. Although sounds simple in principle, this can get complicated pretty quickly, especially in the implementation of the copy assignment operator where we may need to carefully delete an existing resource before copying the new resource received by the operator. Problems like this led to formulating more techniques for carefully managing the resources while satisfying the class invariant. One such technique is the copy-and-swap idiom. None of this is meant to justify the somewhat arbitrary term though. In fact, there are at least two better alternative names for RAII: Scope-Based Resource Management (SBRM) and Constructor Acquires, Destructor Releases (CADR).
- mjevans 2y ago
  CADR is far clearer. Just like re-ordering it as Resource Initialization Is Acquisition.
- justincredible 2y ago
  [dead]

by Xeamek 2y ago

legobmw99 2y ago

I feel like most RAII fans will openly admit that it’s the worst name in the world for such an idea. The idea is that any time you acquire a resource, you should initialize an object with said resource. But I guess “resource allocation should always lead to object initialization” is too long. The reason to do this is precisely so that the resource can be cleaned up at destruction of the object. So even if you had an acronym like RASALTOI, it would still probably be misleading

NekkoDroid 2y ago

RAII is the worst name they could have selected and C++ devs openly admit that. Its more SBRM, Scope Based Resource Management.

susam 2y ago

> It's a bit confusing to have a 'thing' mention one mechanism in its name, but actually being valuable by ensuring some other mechanism. Indeed! When I was first learning C++, I found the term "RAII" quite confusing too. However, after years of experience with this term, associating "RAII" with its intended meaning has become second nature. Having said that, there is at least one way to make better sense of "RAII" and that is considering the fact that in RAII, holding a resource is a class invariant. The resource is acquired during construction (initialisation) and released during destruction (which happens automatically when the object of the class goes out of scope). Throughout the object's lifetime, from construction to destruction, maintaining possession of the acquired resource is an invariant condition. Although sounds simple in principle, this can get complicated pretty quickly, especially in the implementation of the copy assignment operator where we may need to carefully delete an existing resource before copying the new resource received by the operator. Problems like this led to formulating more techniques for carefully managing the resources while satisfying the class invariant. One such technique is the copy-and-swap idiom. None of this is meant to justify the somewhat arbitrary term though. In fact, there are at least two better alternative names for RAII: Scope-Based Resource Management (SBRM) and Constructor Acquires, Destructor Releases (CADR).

mjevans 2y ago
CADR is far clearer. Just like re-ordering it as Resource Initialization Is Acquisition.
justincredible 2y ago
[dead]