Why is returning a reference to a function local value not a compile error?

Question

The following code invokes undefined behaviour.

int& foo()
{
  int bar = 1234;
  return bar;
}

g++ issues a warning:

warning: reference to local variable ‘bar’ returned [-Wreturn-local-addr]

clang++ too:

warning: reference to stack memory associated with local variable 'bar' returned [-Wreturn-stack-address]

Why is this not a compile error (ignoring -Werror)?

Is there a case where returning a ref to a local var is valid?

EDIT As pointed out, the spec mandates this be compilable. So, why does the spec not prohibit such code?

Answer 1

I would say that requiring this to make the program ill-formed (that is, make this a compilation error) would complicate the standard considerably for little benefit. You'd have to exactly spell out in the standard when such cases shall be diagnosed, and all compilers would have to implement them.

If you specify too little, it will not be too useful. And compilers probably already check for this to emit warnings, and real programmers compile with -Wall_you_can_give_me -Werror anyway.

If you specify too much, it will be difficult (or impossible) for compilers to implement the standard.

Consider this class (for which you only have the header and a library):

class Foo
{
  int x;

public:
  int& getInteger();
};

And this code:

int& bar()
{
  Foo f;
  return f.getInteger();
}

Now, should the standard be written to make this ill-formed or not? Probably not, what if Foo is implemented like this:

#include "Foo.h"

int global;

int& Foo::getInteger()
{
  return global;
}

At the same time, it could be implemented like this:

#include "Foo.h"

int& Foo::getInteger()
{
  return x;
}

Which of course would give you a dangling reference.

My point is that the compiler cannot really know whether returning a reference is OK or not, except for a few trivial cases (returning a reference to a function-scope automatic variable or parameter of non-reference type). I don't think it's worth it to complicate the standard for that. Especially as most compilers already warn about this as a quality-of-implementation matter.