Do variable references (alias) incure runtime costs in c++?
- by cheshirekow
Maybe this is a compiler specific thing. If so, how about for gcc (g++)? If you use a variable reference/alias like this:
int x = 5;
int& y = x;
y += 10;
Does it actually require more cycles than if we didn't use the reference.
int x = 5;
x += 10;
In other words, does the machine code change, or does the "alias" happen only at the compiler level?
This may seem like a dumb question, but I am curious. Especially in the case where maybe it would be convenient to temporarily rename some member variables just so that the math code is a little easier to read. Sure, we're not exactly talking about a bottleneck here... but it's something that I'm doing and so I'm just wondering if there is any 'actual' difference... or if it's only cosmetic.
