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In Delphi, why does the Assigned() function still return True after I call the destructor?

The below example code will write "sl is still assigned" to the console.

However, I can call FreeAndNil(sl); and it won't be assigned.

I've been programming in Delphi for a while, but this never made sense to me.

Can someone explain?

program Project1; {$APPTYPE CONSOLE} uses SysUtils, Classes; var sl : TStringList; begin sl := TStringList.Create; sl.Free; if Assigned(sl) then WriteLn('sl is still assigned') else WriteLn('sl is not assigned'); end.

I tried comparing the VCL operations... FreeAndNil is short and sweet and makes sense:

procedure FreeAndNil(var Obj); var P: TObject; begin P := TObject(Obj); TObject(Obj) := nil; // clear the reference before destroying the object P.Free; end;

But TObject.Free is in mysterious assembler, which I don't understand:

procedure TObject.Free; asm TEST EAX,EAX JE @@exit MOV ECX,[EAX] MOV DL,1 CALL dword ptr [ECX].vmtDestroy @@exit: end;
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    This question shows how programmers could conflate variable names that are in one scope, with objects which exist onthe heap. The object is actually memory on the heap, and Free releases that memory on the heap, but it isn't possible for that method to erase the local variable that contains a REFERENCE to the object, but which is NOT the object itself. Even though the pointer semantics in delphi object references which are pointers to objects are mostly hidden, here's one case where the underlying pointer implementation leaks through. Commented Jul 1, 2011 at 23:09

4 Answers 4

Reset to default
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If you use sl.Free, the object is freed but the variable sl still points to the now invalid memory.

Use FreeAndNil(sl) to both free the object and clear the pointer.

By the way, if you do:

var sl1, sl2: TStringList; begin sl1 := TStringList.Create; sl2 := sl1; FreeAndNil(sl1); // sl2 is still assigned and must be cleared separately (not with FreeAndNil because it points to the already freed object.) end; procedure TObject.Free; asm TEST EAX,EAX JE @@exit // Jump to exit if pointer is nil. MOV ECX,[EAX] MOV DL,1 CALL dword ptr [ECX].vmtDestroy // Call cleanup code (and destructor). @@exit: end;
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6 Comments

Are you sure it's threadsafe? vmtDestroy could be easily called twice on the same object, so hopefully that is threadsafe.
As written, in the original question, FreeAndNil() is unfortunately not threadsafe, because two threads could each copy the pointer then both proceed to free the object. FreeAndNil() should really use Interlocked Variable Access ( msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms684122(VS.85).aspx ) .
Calling FreeAndNil thread-safe really mars an otherwise good answer. If you're even at a point where you think you NEED thread-safety while freeing a shared object, you've got bigger problems in your code than you could ever hope for FreeAndNil to solve.
FreeAndNil will not assign nil to all other variables which hold a reference of the same object. It clears only the pointer which is passed as its argument. As a result, the object could be assigned and unassigned at the same time, as Assigned(ObjectRef1) <> Assigned(ObjectRef2) ... :)
Thanks for removing the incorrect statement about thread-safety. This is now a great answer.
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Delphi VCL 'objects' are actually always pointers to objects, but this aspect is typically hidden from you. Just freeing the object leaves the pointer dangling around, so you should use FreeAndNil instead.

The "Mysterious Assembler" translates roughly to:

if Obj != NIL then vmtDestroy(obj); // which is basically the destructor/deallocator.

Because Free checks for NIL first, it's safe to call FreeAndNil multiple times...

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... and set DL register to 1, to mark that Destroy was called with this method and call the associated AfterDestruction method.
3

The Free method of TObject is like the "delete operator" in C++. Calling free will first call the Destroy function and then it will free the memory block that was allocated for the object. By default the pointer to the memory is not then set to zero because this will use up one instruction.

The correct thing to do in most cases is not to set the pointer to zero because in most cases it does not matter. However, sometimes it is important and so you should only nil the pointer for those cases.

For example. In a function where an object is created and then freed at the end of the function there is no point in setting the variable to zero since that is just wasting cpu time.

But for a global object or field that might be referenced again later you should set it to zero. Use FreeAndNil or just set the pointer to nil yourself, does not matter. But stay away from zeroing variables that do not need to be zeroed by default.

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We have simple rules:

  1. If you want to use Assigned() to check if an object Obj is already created or not, then make sure you use FreeAndNil(Obj) to free it.

  2. Assigned() only says if an address is assigned or not.

  3. The local object reference is always assigned a garbage address (some random address), so it is good to set it to nil before using it.

Example: (This is not the full code)

{Opened a new VCL application, placed a Button1, Memo1 on the form Next added a public reference GlobalButton of type TButton Next in OnClick handler of Button1 added a variable LocalButton Next in body, check if GlobalButton and LocalButton are assigned} TForm2 = class(TForm) Button1: TButton; Memo1: TMemo; procedure Button1Click(Sender: TObject); private { Private declarations } public { Public declarations } GlobalButton: TButton; end; procedure TForm2.Button1Click(Sender: TObject); var LocalButton: TButton; begin if Assigned(GlobalButton) then Memo1.Lines.Add('GlobalButton assigned'); if Assigned(LocalButton) then Memo1.Lines.Add('LocalButton assigned'); end;
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