Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> myWindow.setBitmap(myBitmap);

> Does the window have a pointer to my bitmap, or did it copy the bitmap 
> into its own instance variable? In the latter case, I can free my 
> bitmap. In the former case, I cannot. That's what the internal state of 
> a module (in this case an object instance) has to do with memory management.

  If you have to wonder about things like that, then the abstraction
level of the code is not good enough.

  But anyways, the state of an object is defined by the value of its
member attributes.
  Whether or not it uses pointers or whatever to handle memory and how
you should use the class for it to work properly is irrelevant.

  To better understand what the "state" of an object means, suppose
that you can ask a LivingEntity object "are you alive?" and it
returns true or false.
  One LivingEntity can be "alive" while another can be "dead". That
is their state (or part of it).
  *How* they internally implement this information is irrelevant.

-- 
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sphere{0,2pigment{rgbt 1}interior{media{emission 1density{spherical
density_map{[0rgb 0][.5rgb<1,.5>][1rgb 1]}turbulence.9}}}scale
<1,1,3>hollow}text{ttf"timrom""Warp".1,0translate<-1,-.1,2>}//  - Warp -

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