C++ getters/setters coding style

Question

I have been programming in C# for a while and now I want to brush up on my C++ skills.

Having the class:

class Foo
{
    const std::string& name         


        

Answer 1

As an aside, in C++, it is somewhat odd to have a const reference member. You have to assign it in the constructor list. Who owns the actually memory of that object and what is it's lifetime?

As for style, I agree with the others that you don't want to expose your privates. :-) I like this pattern for setters/getters

class Foo
{
public:
  const string& FirstName() const;
  Foo& FirstName(const string& newFirstName);

  const string& LastName() const;
  Foo& LastName(const string& newLastName);

  const string& Title() const;
  Foo& Title(const string& newTitle);
};

This way you can do something like:

Foo f;
f.FirstName("Jim").LastName("Bob").Title("Programmer");