OpenSceneGraph 3.0

ref_ptr<> and Referenced classes

Fortunately, OSG also provides a native smart pointer, osg::ref_ptr<>, for the purpose of automatic garbage collection and deallocation. To make it work properly, OSG also provides the osg::Referenced class to manage reference-counted memory blocks, which is used as the base class of any classes that may serve as the template argument.

The osg::ref_ptr<> class template re-implements a number of C++ operators as well as member functions, and thus provides convenient methods to developers. Its main components are as follows:

• get(): This public method returns the managed pointer, for instance, the osg::Node* pointer if you are using osg::Node as the template argument.
• operator*(): This is actually a dereference operator, ...