23 General utilities library [utilities]

23.11 Smart pointers [smartptr]

23.11.2 Shared-ownership pointers [util.smartptr]

23.11.2.4 Class template owner_­less [util.smartptr.ownerless]

The class template owner_­less allows ownership-based mixed comparisons of shared and weak pointers.

namespace std {
  template<class T = void> struct owner_less;

  template<class T> struct owner_less<shared_ptr<T>> {
    bool operator()(const shared_ptr<T>&, const shared_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
    bool operator()(const shared_ptr<T>&, const weak_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
    bool operator()(const weak_ptr<T>&, const shared_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
  };

  template<class T> struct owner_less<weak_ptr<T>> {
    bool operator()(const weak_ptr<T>&, const weak_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
    bool operator()(const shared_ptr<T>&, const weak_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
    bool operator()(const weak_ptr<T>&, const shared_ptr<T>&) const noexcept;
  };

  template<> struct owner_less<void> {
    template<class T, class U>
      bool operator()(const shared_ptr<T>&, const shared_ptr<U>&) const noexcept;
    template<class T, class U>
      bool operator()(const shared_ptr<T>&, const weak_ptr<U>&) const noexcept;
    template<class T, class U>
      bool operator()(const weak_ptr<T>&, const shared_ptr<U>&) const noexcept;
    template<class T, class U>
      bool operator()(const weak_ptr<T>&, const weak_ptr<U>&) const noexcept;

    using is_transparent = unspecified;
  };
}

operator()(x, y) shall return x.owner_­before(y). [Note: Note that

end note]