[petsc-dev] Get/Restore vs Create/Destroy

[Matthew Knepley]

On Thu, Jul 20, 2017 at 9:25 AM, Blaise A Bourdin <bourdin at lsu.edu> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> It’s always been my understanding that and pets object obtained by a
> XXXGetYYY had to be released with a matching XXXRestoreYYY, and that those
> created using XXXCreateYYY had to be destroyed with a YYYDestroy.
>
> It seems that this convention is getting broken in several place. I
> understand that in several situations, this is because the XXXRestoreYYY
> would essentially do nothing.
>
> Is it safe to assume that if a function XXXGetYYY does not have a matching
> XXXRestoreYYY, the instance of PetscYYY does not have to be destroyed in
> any way?
>

Yes. We use Get in two ways:

  1) Get a borrowed reference. Then nothing has to be done

  2) Get a reference which need extra processing. This requires a matching
Restore


> Is it safe to assume that any instance of a PetscYYY created from
> XXXCreateYYY can be safely destroyed with a YYYDestroy without side effects?
>

Yes.


> If so, should the offending functions be renamed or should something be
> explicitly added to their man page?


We try to always have the matching restore on the manpage. If it is not, we
should fix it.

  Thanks,

    Matt


>
> Blaise
>
> --
> Department of Mathematics and Center for Computation & Technology
> Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA
> Tel. +1 (225) 578 1612, Fax  +1 (225) 578 4276 http://www.math.lsu.edu/~
> bourdin
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>


-- 
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