Question

The explicit keyword is recommended for all most constructors which can be called with one argument, except for copy constructors.

For copy constructors, it has an use (to forbid implicit copying via function call, return, etc), but it’s not what’s usually wanted.

What about move constructors? Is there any reasonable use case to make them explicit? What’s the good practice here?

Answer 1

An explicit move constructors can affect compatibility with e.g. Standard algorithms. For instance, std::swap<T> requires that T be MoveConstructible. In turn, MoveConstructible is specified in terms of an expression, namely T u = rv; (where rv is an rvalue of type T).

If there is neither a non-explicit copy constructor nor a non-explicit move constructor for a given type then T u = rv; is invalid and that type can’t be used with std::swap. (In this particular instance however it is possible to specialize std::swap to provide the desired functionality, e.g. by using T u(rv);).

Put more simply, an explicit move or copy constructor defies expectations and can’t be used as well with generic code.

Some other parts of the Standard library that put a MoveConstructible requirement:

• the deleter of unique_ptr<T, D>
• call wrappers, used in e.g. bind (all the decayed types that are passed are concerned)
• thread, async, call_once (all specified in terms of call wrappers)
• sort, stable_sort, nth_element, sort_heap