Question

If I have a class that contains private static data allocated on the heap that never changes, when, if at all, should I delete it?

As I understand it, a class itself is never constructed (because classes aren’t first class objects in C++) then there is no destructor to delete the static data in? Im new at C++ so sorry if my understanding of c++ is fundamentaly flawed or if the answer is obvious!
Thanks in advance, ell.

Answer 1

If the data is static, it isn’t allocated on the heap, and it will be
destructed during the shutdown of the process.

If it is a pointer to the data which is static, e.g.:

Something* MyClass::aPointer = new Something;

then like all other dynamically allocated data, it will only be
destructed when you delete it. There are two frequent solutions:

• use a smart pointer, which has a destructor which deletes it, or

• don’t delete it; in most cases, there’s really no reason to call the destructor, and if you happen to use the instance in the destructors of other static objects, you’ll run into an order of destruction problem.