Destructor parameters

Thomas Matthews picture Thomas Matthews · Jun 5, 2011 · Viewed 32k times · Source

The article Are destructors overloadable? talks about overloading the destructor.

This raised a question: Can a destructor have parameters?

I've never used or seen a destructor with parameters. I could not come up with an example of a reason to use parameters to the destructor.

Answer

Mat picture Mat · Jun 5, 2011

Section §12.4 of C++0x draft n3290 has this to say about destructors:

Destructors

A special declarator syntax using an optional function-specifier (7.1.2) followed by ˜ followed by the destructor’s class name followed by an empty parameter list is used to declare the destructor in a class definition.

(emphasis added)

So no, destructors do not take parameters. (The 2003 standard has the exact wording of the above paragraph.)