The convention I use in my own code is that passing a raw pointer around, or returning one, confers ownership. Mostly I do not schlep raw pointers around betwee

The convention I use in my own code is that passing a raw pointer around, or returning one, confers ownership. Mostly I do not schlep raw pointers around between functions, though. I use shared_ptr or scoped_ptr or unique_ptr or a reference. When I have to use raw pointers with some given library, then I immediately wrap their usage in my own facade types. Sticking to these oft-repeated best practices means that crashes are rare and memory leaks are rarer still.