When an object containing virtual functions is created, its VPTR must be initialized to point to the proper VTABLE. This must be done before there’s any possibility of calling a virtual function. As you might guess, because the constructor has the job of bringing an object into existence, it is also the constructor’s job to set up the VPTR. The compiler secretly inserts code into the beginning of the constructor that initializes the VPTR. And as described in Chapter 14, if you don’t explicitly create a constructor for a class, the compiler will synthesize one for you. If the class has virtual functions, the synthesized constructor will include the proper VPTR initialization code. This has several implications.

The first concerns efficiency. The reason for inline functions is to reduce the calling overhead for small functions. If C++ didn’t provide inline functions, the preprocessor might be used to create these “macros.” However, the preprocessor has no concept of access or classes, and therefore couldn’t be used to create member function macros. In addition, with constructors that must have hidden code inserted by the compiler, a preprocessor macro wouldn’t work at all.

You must be aware when hunting for efficiency holes that the compiler is inserting hidden code into your constructor function. Not only must it initialize the VPTR, it must also check the value of this (in case the operator new returns zero) and call base-class constructors. Taken together, this code can impact what you thought was a tiny inline function call. In particular, the size of the constructor may overwhelm the savings you get from reduced function-call overhead. If you make a lot of inline constructor calls, your code size can grow without any benefits in speed.

Of course, you probably won’t make all tiny constructors non-inline right away, because they’re much easier to write as inlines. But when you’re tuning your code, remember to consider removing the inline constructors.

The second interesting facet of constructors and virtual functions concerns the order of constructor calls and the way virtual calls are made within constructors.

All base-class constructors are always called in the constructor for an inherited class. This makes sense because the constructor has a special job: to see that the object is built properly. A derived class has access only to its own members, and not those of the base class. Only the base-class constructor can properly initialize its own elements. Therefore it’s essential that all constructors get called; otherwise the entire object wouldn’t be constructed properly. That’s why the compiler enforces a constructor call for every portion of a derived class. It will call the default constructor if you don’t explicitly call a base-class constructor in the constructor initializer list. If there is no default constructor, the compiler will complain.

The order of the constructor calls is important. When you inherit, you know all about the base class and can access any public and protected members of the base class. This means you must be able to assume that all the members of the base class are valid when you’re in the derived class. In a normal member function, construction has already taken place, so all the members of all parts of the object have been built. Inside the constructor, however, you must be able to assume that all members that you use have been built. The only way to guarantee this is for the base-class constructor to be called first. Then when you’re in the derived-class constructor, all the members you can access in the base class have been initialized. “Knowing all members are valid” inside the constructor is also the reason that, whenever possible, you should initialize all member objects (that is, objects placed in the class using composition) in the constructor initializer list. If you follow this practice, you can assume that all base class members and member objects of the current object have been initialized.

The hierarchy of constructor calls brings up an interesting dilemma. What happens if you’re inside a constructor and you call a virtual function? Inside an ordinary member function you can imagine what will happen – the virtual call is resolved at runtime because the object cannot know whether it belongs to the class the member function is in, or some class derived from it. For consistency, you might think this is what should happen inside constructors.

This is not the case. If you call a virtual function inside a constructor, only the local version of the function is used. That is, the virtual mechanism doesn’t work within the constructor.

This behavior makes sense for two reasons. Conceptually, the constructor’s job is to bring the object into existence (which is hardly an ordinary feat). Inside any constructor, the object may only be partially formed – you can only know that the base-class objects have been initialized, but you cannot know which classes are inherited from you. A virtual function call, however, reaches “forward” or “outward” into the inheritance hierarchy. It calls a function in a derived class. If you could do this inside a constructor, you’d be calling a function that might manipulate members that hadn’t been initialized yet, a sure recipe for disaster.

The second reason is a mechanical one. When a constructor is called, one of the first things it does is initialize its VPTR. However, it can only know that it is of the “current” type – the type the constructor was written for. The constructor code is completely ignorant of whether or not the object is in the base of another class. When the compiler generates code for that constructor, it generates code for a constructor of that class, not a base class and not a class derived from it (because a class can’t know who inherits it). So the VPTR it uses must be for the VTABLE of that class. The VPTR remains initialized to that VTABLE for the rest of the object’s lifetime unless this isn’t the last constructor call. If a more-derived constructor is called afterwards, that constructor sets the VPTR to its VTABLE, and so on, until the last constructor finishes. The state of the VPTR is determined by the constructor that is called last. This is another reason why the constructors are called in order from base to most-derived.

But while all this series of constructor calls is taking place, each constructor has set the VPTR to its own VTABLE. If it uses the virtual mechanism for function calls, it will produce only a call through its own VTABLE, not the most-derived VTABLE (as would be the case after all the constructors were called). In addition, many compilers recognize that a virtual function call is being made inside a constructor, and perform early binding because they know that late-binding will produce a call only to the local function. In either event, you won’t get the results you might initially expect from a virtual function call inside a constructor.

You cannot use the virtual keyword with constructors, but destructors can and often must be virtual.

The constructor has the special job of putting an object together piece-by-piece, first by calling the base constructor, then the more derived constructors in order of inheritance (it must also call member-object constructors along the way). Similarly, the destructor has a special job: it must disassemble an object that may belong to a hierarchy of classes. To do this, the compiler generates code that calls all the destructors, but in the reverse order that they are called by the constructor. That is, the destructor starts at the most-derived class and works its way down to the base class. This is the safe and desirable thing to do because the current destructor can always know that the base-class members are alive and active. If you need to call a base-class member function inside your destructor, it is safe to do so. Thus, the destructor can perform its own cleanup, then call the next-down destructor, which will perform its own cleanup, etc. Each destructor knows what its class is derived from, but not what is derived from it.

You should keep in mind that constructors and destructors are the only places where this hierarchy of calls must happen (and thus the proper hierarchy is automatically generated by the compiler). In all other functions, only that function will be called (and not base-class versions), whether it’s virtual or not. The only way for base-class versions of the same function to be called in ordinary functions (virtual or not) is if you explicitly call that function.

Normally, the action of the destructor is quite adequate. But what happens if you want to manipulate an object through a pointer to its base class (that is, manipulate the object through its generic interface)? This activity is a major objective in object-oriented programming. The problem occurs when you want to delete a pointer of this type for an object that has been created on the heap with new. If the pointer is to the base class, the compiler can only know to call the base-class version of the destructor during delete. Sound familiar? This is the same problem that virtual functions were created to solve for the general case. Fortunately, virtual functions work for destructors as they do for all other functions except constructors.

When you run the program, you’ll see that delete bp only calls the base-class destructor, while delete b2p calls the derived-class destructor followed by the base-class destructor, which is the behavior we desire. Forgetting to make a destructor virtual is an insidious bug because it often doesn’t directly affect the behavior of your program, but it can quietly introduce a memory leak. Also, the fact that some destruction is occurring can further mask the problem.

Even though the destructor, like the constructor, is an “exceptional” function, it is possible for the destructor to be virtual because the object already knows what type it is (whereas it doesn’t during construction). Once an object has been constructed, its VPTR is initialized, so virtual function calls can take place.