Folding Functions--Sumant Tambe

Let's use those fold operators!

Folding Functions

by Sumant Tambe

From the article:

In the last post we looked at basic usage of C++17 Fold Expressions. I found that many posts on this topic discuss simple types and ignore how folds may be applicable to more complex types as well. In this post I'm going to describe folding over functions...

Report from using std::cpp 2016 -- Daniel Garcia

Daniel Garcia reports from the recent std::cpp conference:

Conference Report

by Daniel Garcia

From the report:

Last November 24th we had the fourth edition of using std::cpp, our annual spanish conference on C++ for professional developers. The conference is a one-day free event held every year at University Carlos III of Madrid, in Leganés. We had around 200 registered attendees (most of them professional developers).

We would like to share some answers from the evaluation questionaries:

  • 75% of attendees were professional developers, 14% were students, and 11% were academics.
  • 92% declared they use regularly C++.
  • The most popular version of C++ was C++11 (73%), followed by C++98/03 (63%) and C++14 (21%). Note that you could vote for more than one. However, no one declared to make use of any extension or TS.
  • Most popular compiler was gcc (60%), followed by Microsoft (57%), and clang++ (14%).
  • When we asked for domains a found a split among multiple sectors: telco (20%), aerospace/naval (11%), civil engineering (9%), bank/finance/insurance (7%), developer tools (7%), videogames (6%), research/academia (4%), transport (4%), industrial manufacturing (2%).

 

Emscriptened -- Adi Shavit

The `path` to the web.

Emscriptened!

by Adi Shavit

From the article:

It might be a fun little project to generate a web-based interactive version of the effects of various methods of `filesystem::path`.

 

C++17 Talks by Nicolai Josuttis @ NDC London

Nicolai Josuttis speaks on the upcoming NDC conference in London about:

nico_josuttis_casual_small_120911.jpg

C++17 Core and Library Features


by Nicolai Josuttis

About the talk:

On January 19, 2017, Nicolai Josuttis, the author of The C++ Standard Library, will give two talks at the NDC conference in London about the core and library features of the upcoming C++17.

 

Return early and clearly--Arne Mertz

How to return well:

Return early and clearly

by Arne Mertz

From the article:

There are different guidelines out there about where and how many return statements to use in a function, e.g. return only once at the end of the function or return early and often. Which one makes for the most readable code?

CppCast Episode 83: Regular Void with Matt Calabrese

Episode 83 of CppCast the only podcast for C++ developers by C++ developers. In this episode Rob and Jason are joined by Matt Calabrese to talk about his Regular Void Proposal, template<auto>, the state of Concepts and more.

CppCast Episode 83: Regular Void with Matt Calabrese

by Rob Irving and Jason Turner

About the interviewee:

Matt Calabrese is a software engineer working primarily in C++. He started his programming career in the game industry and is now working on libraries at Google. Matt has been active in the Boost community for over a decade, is currently a member of the Boost Steering Committee, and is a member of the Program Committee for C++Now. Starting in the fall of 2015, he has been attending C++ Standards Committee meetings, authoring several proposals targeting the standard after C++17, notably including a proposal to turn the void type into an instantiable type and a proposal for the standard library to introduce a generic algorithm for invoking standard Callables with argument types and argument amounts that may be partially calculated at compile-time or at runtime. He is also the author of the controversial paper "Why I want Concepts, but why they should come later rather than sooner", which may have contributed to the decision to not include the concepts language feature in C++17.

Building a hybrid spin mutex in C++ -- Foster Brereton

Forster Brereton reports about his first steps to build a hybrid mutex.

Building a hybrid spin mutex in C++

by Foster Brereton

From the article

Blocking Mutexes
A blocking mutex will halt the thread until it acquisition. It is useful because it consumes negligible computer resources while blocked. This leaves the CPU free to perform other tasks, including whatever other task currently owns the mutex. All this goodness is not cheap, however: it takes a decent amount of time to block thread. If your critical section is brief, you could be spending a disproportionate amount of time protecting it instead of running it.
Generally, blocking mutexes should be used when your critical section will take a while, such as I/O operations, calling out to the OS, or doing laundry in a collegiate dorm.


Spinning Mutexes
A spinning mutex will enter into an infinite loop (spin) until acquisition. It is useful because it can resume very quickly once the lock has been obtained, resulting in minimal overhead while protecting a critical section. However, since the thread remains active on the CPU, it can reduce (or eliminate!) the ability of the CPU to do other work††. If your critical section is long, you could be spending a disproportionate amount of time protecting it instead of running it.
Generally, spin mutexes should be used when your critical section is brief, such as reading or writing a memory-resident data structure.

Finding a middle ground
The dichotomy between the two mutex behaviors has left me stuck more than once. What if I was trying to protect a global resource that occasionally required a call to the OS? In those cases a blocking mutex is not a good fit, as modifying the memory-resident structure is pretty quick. However a spin mutex would be equally bad, because I do need to go to the OS time and again, and it would be a pessimization to spike a CPU while doing so.