operator overloading/destructor problem

I am building a bigint class and currently having an issue with overloading operators simple +, -, and * operators with my destructor. The bigint class contains a dynamically allocated array of int's. When my destructor is called, the dynamically allocated memory gets dissolved.

When overloading +, -, and *, I create a new bigint called answer which, obviously, holds the answer to the operations. My problem is that I return answer from the operator overloading functions, and at that point my destructor is automatically called and deletes the array I was trying to pass back as a part of the answer. This is causing me all sorts of trouble. Any ideas on how to fix it??

Thank You!!!!!

re: operator overloading/destructor problem

I think you will know that "a destructor is called for a class object when that object passes out of scope" . You are certain this is not your case.....This is a simple thing, but many of us (rather me) tend to forget this often....

re: operator overloading/destructor problem

I'll bet you haven't written a copy constructor and are just passing back the address of the array rather than a copy of it.

re: operator overloading/destructor problem

ah, yes... you are completely right... i did miss that... thank you much!