Returning several values from a function in C++ (C++23 edition) -- Daniel Lemire

By Blog Staff | Jul 15, 2025 02:43 PM | Tags: None

While C++ doesn’t have native syntax for returning multiple values like some other languages, modern C++ offers powerful tools to accomplish the same goal. With features like std::tuple, structured bindings, std::expected, and std::optional, handling multiple return values—and even error codes—has become both clean and expressive.

Returning several values from a function in C++ (C++23 edition)

by Daniel Lemire

From the article:

Many programming languages such as the Go programming language are designed to make it easy to return several values at once from a function. In Go, it is often used to return an optional error code. The C++ programming language does not have a built-in support for returning several values. However, several standard types can serve the same purpose. If you need to return two values, you can use an std::pair instance. If you need to return two or more values, an std::tuple instance will do. With recent C++ standards, it works really well!

Suppose we want to compute a division with a string error message when one is trying to divided by zero:

std::tuple<int,std::string> divide(int a, int b) {
 if (b == 0) {
 return {0, "Error: Division by zero"};
 }
 return {a / b, "Success"};
}

This approach works nicely. The code is clear and readable.

You might be concerned that we are fixing the type (int). If you want to write one function for all integer types, you can do so with concepts, like so:

Constructing Containers from Ranges in C++23 -- Sandor Dargo

By Blog Staff | Jul 11, 2025 02:37 PM | Tags: None

Starting from C++23, standard containers support a new set of constructor overloads. These constructors take a std::from_range tag, a range and an optional allocator. These from_range constructors make it easier to construct containers from ranges, helping make C++ code more concise, more expressive, and less error-prone.

Constructing Containers from Ranges in C++23

by Sandor Dargo

From the article:

I’ve written plenty on this blog about standard algorithms, but far less about ranges. That’s mostly because, although I’ve had production-ready compilers with C++20 ranges since late 2021, the original ranges library lacked a few key capabilities.

The biggest gap was at the end of a pipeline: you could transform data lazily, but you couldn’t drop the result straight into a brand-new container. What you got back was a view; turning that view into, say, a std::vector still required the old iterator-pair constructor.

C++23 fixes that in two complementary ways:

• std::to (an adaptor that finishes a pipeline by converting to a container), and
• from_range constructors on every standard container.

Today we’ll focus on the second improvement, because it’s the one you can implement in your own types, too.

The from_range constructor

Every standard container now supports a new set of constructors that make integration with ranges smoother — the so-called from_range constructors.

These constructors allow you to build a container directly from a range, rather than from a pair of iterators.

C++ Insights now uses Clang 20 -- Andreas Fertig

By Blog Staff | Jul 9, 2025 02:34 PM | Tags: None

Time flies—C++ Insights just turned 7! To celebrate, I’ve upgraded the tool to Clang 20, unlocking even more C++23 and C++26 features for you to explore.

C++ Insights now uses Clang 20

by Andreas Fertig

From the article:

size_t

For a long time now, when you used size_t or std::size_t the resulting transformation kept the name. It did not expand to the underlying machine-specific date type. To be honest, that was more like a happy accident. Clang 20 came with two changes to libc++

The first https://github.com/llvm/llvm-project/commit/d6832a611a7c4ec36f08b1cfe9af850dad32da2e modularized <cstddef> for better internal structuring, avoiding too much content to be included. This patch was followed by a second one: https://github.com/llvm/llvm-project/commit/5acc4a3dc0e2145d2bfef47f1543bb291c2b866a. This one now made an interesting change.

Previously, libc++ defined std::size_t as

1	using ::size_t _LIBCPP_USING_IF_EXISTS;

As the second patch highlighted, this required including the operating systems <stddef.h>. In the spirit of reducing unnecessary includes the line was changed to:

1	using size_t = decltype(sizeof(int));

This is an easy C++ solution to get the proper data type for size_t. Which is great. Yet, the AST nodes of the two versions look different. Previously, the operating system (macOS in this case) defined in its header:

1	typedef unsigned long size_t;

Well, with the new version, the transformation no longer stops at size_t but expands it all down to unsigned long. This probably should have been the case from the beginning, but I liked that tests and transformations did not change across platforms in this specific case. However, there are other instances where the transformation did yield different output on different platforms, so I accept this one.

 

What’s New for C++ Developers in Visual Studio 2022 17.14 -- Sy Brand

By Blog Staff | Jul 7, 2025 02:31 PM | Tags: None

Visual Studio 2022 version 17.14 is now generally available! This post summarizes the new features you can find in this release for C++. You can download Visual Studio 2022 from the Visual Studio downloads page or upgrade your existing installation by following the Update Visual Studio Learn page.

What’s New for C++ Developers in Visual Studio 2022 17.14

by Sy Brand

From the article:

We’ve made a myriad of fixes and improvements to the MSVC compiler and standard library. See C++ Language Updates in MSVC in Visual Studio 2022 17.14 for a full list of changes on the compiler side, and the STL Changelog for all the standard library updates.

Compiler

We’ve added support for several C++23 features, which are available under the /std:c++latest and /std:c++23preview flags.

You can now omit () in some forms of lambdas that previously required them, thanks to P1102R2:

auto lambda = [] constexpr { }; //no '()' needed after the capture list

We implemented if consteval, with which you can run different code depending on whether the statement is executed at compile time or run time. This is useful for cases where your run time version can be heavily optimized with compiler intrinsics or inline assembly that are not available at compile time:

constexpr size_t strlen(char const* s) {
    if consteval {
        // if executed at compile time, use a constexpr-friendly algorithm
        for (const char *p = s; ; ++p) {
            if (*p == '\0') {
                return static_cast<std::size_t>(p - s);
            }
        }
    } else {
        // if executed at run time, use inline assembly
        __asm__("SSE 4.2 magic");
    }
}

C++26: Erroneous Behaviour -- Sandor Dargo

By Blog Staff | Jul 3, 2025 02:29 PM | Tags: None

C++’s undefined behaviour impacts safety. Sandor Dargo explains how and why uninitialised reads will become erroneous behaviour in C++26, rather than being undefined behaviour.

C++26: Erroneous Behaviour

by Sandor Dargo

From the article:

If you pick a random talk at a C++ conference these days, there is a fair chance that the speaker will mention safety at least a couple of times. It’s probably fine like that. The committee and the community must think about improving both the safety situation and the reputation of C++.

If you follow what’s going on in this space, you are probably aware that people have different perspectives on safety. I think almost everybody finds it important, but they would solve the problem in their own way.

A big source of issues is certain manifestations of undefined behaviour. It affects both the safety and the stability of software. I remember that a few years ago when I was working on some services which had to support a 10× growth, one of the important points was to eliminate undefined behaviour as much as possible. One main point for us was to remove uninitialized variables which often lead to crashing services.

Thanks to P2795R5 by Thomas Köppe, uninitialized reads won’t be undefined behaviour anymore – starting from C++26. Instead, they will get a new behaviour called ‘erroneous behaviour’.

The great advantage of erroneous behaviour is that it will work just by recompiling existing code. It will diagnose where you forgot to initialize variables. You don’t have to systematically go through your code and let’s say declare everything as auto to make sure that every variable has an initialized value. Which you probably wouldn’t do anyway.

Writing Senders -- Lucian Radu Teodorescu

By Blog Staff | Jul 1, 2025 02:26 PM | Tags: None

Senders/receivers can be used to introduce concurrency. Lucian Radu Teodorescu describes how to implement senders.

Writing Senders

by Lucian Radu Teodorescu

From the article:

If people are just using frameworks based on std::execution, they mainly need to care about senders and schedulers. These are user-facing concepts. However, if people want to implement sender-ready abstractions, they also need to consider receivers and operation states – these are implementer-side concepts. As this article mainly focuses on the implementation of sender abstractions, we need to discuss these two concepts in more detail.

A receiver is defined in P2300 as “a callback that supports more than one channel” [P2300R10]. The proposal defines a concept for a receiver, unsurprisingly called receiver. To model this concept, a type needs to meet the following conditions:

• It must be movable and copyable.
• It must have an inner type alias named receiver_concept that is equal to receiver_t (or a derived type).
• std::execution::get_env() must be callable on an object of this type (to retrieve the environment of the receiver).

A receiver is the object that receives the sender’s completion signal, i.e., one of set_value(), set_error(), or set_stopped(). As explained in the December 2024 issue [Teodorescu24], a sender may have different value completion types and different error completion types. For example, the same sender might sometimes complete with set_value(int, int), sometimes with set_value(double), sometimes with set_error(std::exception_ptr), sometimes with set_error(std::error_code), and sometimes with set_stopped(). This implies that a receiver must also be able to accept multiple types of completion signals.

C++26: constexpr Exceptions -- Sandor Dargo

By Blog Staff | Jun 27, 2025 02:07 PM | Tags: None

In recent weeks, we’ve explored language features and library features becoming constexpr in C++26. Those articles weren’t exhaustive — I deliberately left out one major topic: exceptions.

Starting with C++26, it will become possible to throw exceptions during constant evaluation. This capability is enabled through both language and library changes. Given the significance of this feature, it deserves its own dedicated post.

C++26: constexpr Exceptions

by Sandor Dargo

From the article:

P3068R6: Allowing exception throwing in constant-evaluation

The proposal for static reflection suggested allowing exceptions in constant-evaluated code, and P3068R6 brings that feature to life.

constexpr exceptions are conceptually similar to constexpr allocations. Just as a constexpr string can’t escape constant evaluation and reach runtime, constexpr exceptions also have to remain within compile-time code.

Previously, using throw in a constexpr context caused a compilation error. With C++26, such code can now compile — unless an exception is actually thrown and left uncaught, in which case a compile-time error is still issued. But the error now provides more meaningful diagnostics.

 

CppCon 2024 The UB Detector: constexpr -- Andreas Fertig

By Blog Staff | Jun 26, 2025 01:28 PM | Tags: None

Registration is now open for CppCon 2025! The conference starts on September 15 and will be held in person in Aurora, CO. To whet your appetite for this year’s conference, we’re posting videos of some of the top-rated talks from last year's conference. Here’s another CppCon talk video we hope you will enjoy – and why not register today for CppCon 2025!

Lightning Talk: The UB Detector: constexpr

by Andreas Fertig

Summary of the talk:

A constexpr function evaluated at compile time is free of any undefined behaviour they say. Do you think that statement is true as well?

Talks and a first schedule for Meeting C++ 2025

By Meeting C++ | Jun 26, 2025 06:51 AM | Tags: meetingcpp event conference community

This week Meeting C++ published the accepted talks and a first schedule for the conference in November.

Schedule for Meeting C++ 2025

The talks for Meeting C++ 2025

by Jens Weller

From the article:

Top 10 voted talks

    To Err is Human: Robust Error Handling in C++26 - Sebastian Theophil
    Seeing all possible paths forward - Hana Dusíková
    Code Reviews: Building Better Code and Stronger Teams - Sandor Dargo
    The Two memory Models - Anders Schau Knatten
    How to become obsolete: a guide to software engineering mentorship - Roth Michaels
    Branch Prediction: Lessons from the hot path - John Farrier
    Towards Safety and Security in C++26 - Daniela Engert
    The data-parallel types (SIMD) library in C++26 - Rainer Grimm
    The Code is Documentation Enough - Tina Ulbrich
    Range adaptors - 5 years after C++20 - Hannes Hauswedell
    Speed for free - current state of auto-vectorizing compilers - Stefan Fuhrmann

 

An option(al) to surprise you -- Andreas Fertig

By Blog Staff | Jun 25, 2025 02:01 PM | Tags: None

In today's post I share a learning of a customer with you. A while back, a customer asked me to join a debugging session. They had an issue they didn't (fully) understand.

An option(al) to surprise you

by Andreas Fertig

From the article:

The base

What I will show you is a much down-stripped and, of course, altered version. It was about a message system, but that's not important. Have a look at the code below.

You can see a class enum for a state and a function Worker. The function takes a State and a const char* message named data. The function's job is to create a std::optional containing the user data, a C-style string.