Why is it wrong to use std::auto_ptr<> with standard containers?
The C++ Standard says that an STL element must be "copy-constructible" and "assignable." In other words, an element must be able to be assigned or copied and the two elements are logically independent. std::auto_ptr does not fulfill this requirement.
Take for example this code:
class X
{
};
std::vector<std::auto_ptr<X> > vecX;
vecX.push_back(new X);
std::auto_ptr<X> pX = vecX[0]; // vecX[0] is assigned NULL.
To overcome this limitation, you should use the std::unique_ptr, std::shared_ptr or std::weak_ptr smart pointers or the boost equivalents if you don't have C++11. Here is the boost library documentation for these smart pointers.