Should this simple structure have an implicit move constructor? - c++11

Question

In this test:
#include <string>
struct thing {
std::string name_;
};
class test {
thing id_;
public:
test(thing id) : id_{std::move(id)} {}
};
I would expect struct thing to have an implicit move constructor, so that class test can use std::move() to initialise its data member.
Clang version 3.4.1 gives this error:
error: no viable conversion from 'typename remove_reference<thing&>::type' (aka 'thing') to 'std::string' (aka 'basic_string<char, char_traits<char>, allocator<char> >')
The problem can be solved by adding a move constructor to struct thing, which of course means that a converting constructor and an explicitly defaulted copy constructor also needs to be added.
I do not understand why I cannot move struct thing around implicitly.

Answer 1

You are using a brace initialization - id_{std::move(id)}. In your case, as though struct thing is a POD (plain old data) it means, that C++ compiler tries to initialize the first member - std::string name_ instead of using a default constructor of struct thing object. Read more about aggregates and PODs.
In this case, because of the braces, class test's constructor is equivalent to something like this:
class test {
thing id_;
public:
test(thing id) {
id_.name_ = std::move(id); // Notice that this causes
// the "no viable conversion" error
}
};
Solution 1: You need to declare explicitly that you want to use a default struct thing's constructor by using parenthesis instead of braces:
#include <string>
struct thing {
std::string name_;
};
class test {
thing id_;
public:
test(thing id) : id_(std::move(id)) {} // Default c-tor will be used
};
Solution 2: You could also declare a user-defined constructor of struct thing to make it non-POD:
#include <string>
struct thing {
std::string name_;
thing(thing&&) {} // Used-defined move constructor
};
class test {
thing id_;
public:
test(thing id) : id_{std::move(id)} {} // You can use braces again
};