hmm...i'm gonna have to go smack arround a few of my past teachers cause i've never been told anything about that. i wonder if thats cause its less of an issue now than it used to be, what with more RAM and processing power so the speed that the commands get exicuted and the ammount of space the chances are only miniscule that it will get overwritten.

maybe more modern compilers wait till after the return value has been copied to release the memory? i dunno, just shooting in the dark cause i find it so odd that its never been mentioned by any teachers or in any books i've had thusfar.