Question

Given the two scenarios, which code is best practice and why?

Autorelease

loginButton = [[[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Login" 
                                                style:UIBarButtonItemStylePlain 
                                                target:self 
                                                action:@selector(loginButtonClicked:)]
                                                autorelease];
self.navigationItem.rightBarButtonItem = loginButton;

or

Release

loginButton = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Login" 
                                                style:UIBarButtonItemStylePlain 
                                                target:self 
                                                action:@selector(loginButtonClicked:)];
self.navigationItem.rightBarButtonItem = loginButton;
[loginButton release];

Answer 1

There seems to be a stigma against using autorelease (i.e. prefer to release whenever possible), which is why I typically go the second route. But since you’re not in a loop here, releasing now vs. autoreleasing later will have exactly the same effect (since another object has retained loginButton, it won’t be dealloc()ed).

But I should point out that most of my memory leaks are caused by forgetting to add the release line, so it would probably be better to just tack on the autorelease right away.