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C++ Compiler Benchmarks--Imagine Raytracer

By Adrien Hamelin | Dec 19, 2014 04:38 PM | Tags: performance efficiency

On the blog Imagine Raytracer a few days ago:

C++ Compiler Benchmarks

by Imagine Raytracer

From the article:

[...] I decided to try 4.9.2 which had just been released. This seemed to showed a fairly serious regression in terms of speed (speed being a pretty important aspect for a renderer), so I decided I'd do a more comprehensive comparison of the latest main compilers for the Linux platform, as back in 2011 and 2012 I used to do compiler benchmarks (GCC, LLVM and ICC) regularly every six months or so on my own code (including Imagine), and on the commercial VFX compositor made by the company I worked for at the time, and it had been a while since I'd compared them myself...

LINQ-like List Manipulation in C++

By ltorje | Dec 18, 2014 12:25 PM | Tags: None

Cross platform LINQ for C++ 

LINQ-like List Manipulation in C++

by Gaston Hillar

From the article:

When developers make the move from C# to C++, they definitely miss Language-Integrated Query (LINQ) features. Cpplinq is an excellent open-source project that uses C++11 features to provide extensible LINQ-like list manipulation to C++.

I'm sad to say Farewell Dr. Dobb's. Thank you for all the good articles.

Software Duct Tape: Binding the C++ Universe Together -- Glennan Carnie

By Blog Staff | Dec 16, 2014 08:51 AM | Tags: None

In case you missed it last week on Sticky Bits:

Software Duct Tape -- Binding the C++  Universe Together

by Glennan Carnie

From the article:

One of the cornerstones of object-oriented design is the concept of objects interacting by sending messages to form mechanisms – units of higher-order (or ‘emergent’) behaviour.

In order to send a message (in this case, invoke a member function) an object must have a ‘link’ to the target object. That link is formed by building in an association between the two classes as part of the type’s definition.

In this article we look at building associations between classes and forming run-time links so objects can communicate...

Lessons to learn from John Carmack and Oculus [about] the "Modern C++" approach -- CoderGears Team

By Blog Staff | Dec 16, 2014 08:44 AM | Tags: None

Fresh on CoderGears:

Lessons to learn from John Carmack and Oculus development team when using the “Modern C++” approach

by CoderGears Team

From the article:

In the previous post about Doom3, we discovered that it was developed using the “C with Classes” approach. John Carmack is the main developer and it was between 2000 and 2004, what explains why “Modern C++” approach was not adopted. And, even if “C with Classes” is not recommended, he made some good decisions to have clean code.

John Carmack is now the oculus VR CTO, Oculus VR is an American virtual reality technology company founded by Palmer Luckey and Brendan Iribe. Their first product, still in development, is the Oculus Rift, a head-mounted display for immersive virtual reality (VR).

Oculus provides an SDK which includes its source code, it’s developed using C++.  For this project the Modern C++ approach was adopted. Let’s discover some design and implementation choices of John Carmack and his team...

Quick Q: What is constexpr useful for? -- StackOverflow

By Blog Staff | Dec 16, 2014 08:37 AM | Tags: None

Quick A: When you need the constant to be available at compile time.

Today on SO:

What are 'constexpr' useful for?

I really can't find any use of it. My first idea was that I could use it to implement 'Design by Contract' without using macros like this:

struct S
{  
    S(constexpr int i) : S(i) { static_assert( i < 9, "i must be < 9" ); }

    S(int i); //external defintion

    char *pSomeMemory;
};

But this wouldn't compile. I thought we could also use it to reference same-variable without the need of additional memory to be created when we want to avoid the get/setters in order to make instances to one member from users to be read-only:

class S
{ 
private:
    int _i;

public:
    const int & constexpr i = _i;
};

But none of the above actually compiled. Can someone give me some insight why this keyword was being introduced?

Using assertions -- Andrzej Krzemieński

By Blog Staff | Dec 16, 2014 08:31 AM | Tags: basics

Today on Andrzej's blog:

Using assertions

by Andrzej Krzemieński

From the article:

This post is a response to my recent encounters with fellow programmers who appear to me to be missing the point of assertions and fail to appreciate their usefulness. The first post I have ever written here was on assertions, I still find it good, so there is no need to repeat it; here I will only describe how I observe people treat assertions and why I believe it is wrong.

I am reviewing the following code...

Tutorial on Tag Dispatching -- Crazy Eddie

By Blog Staff | Dec 16, 2014 08:24 AM | Tags: metaprogramming advanced

Fresh on Crazy Eddie's Crazy C++ (fortunately not entirely true...):

Tutorial on tag dispatching

by Crazy Eddie

From the article:

... There’s been some confused notions passed around recently that lead me to think there needs to be more information about probably one of the simplest, most powerful metaprogramming techniques that exist in C++: tag dispatching. The reason tag dispatching is powerful is that it leverages the language and the compiler to do work for you so that you don’t have to. It’s a technique whereby you use overload resolution rules to decide between otherwise ambiguous functions.

Concepts and tags

The first part to understand with regard to tag dispatching is the idea of “concepts”...

A Tiny Metaprogramming Library -- Manu Sánchez

By Jordi Mon Companys | Dec 16, 2014 04:53 AM | Tags: template metaprogramming metaprogramming community advanced

Manu Sánchez is proposing a little-big collaborative challenge to the C++ community. Learning how to build:

A Tiny Metaprogramming Library

by Manu Sánchez

The proposal:

I hope you like this idea. It’s not only me writing crazy meta-stuff, but everybody developing their own metaprogramming library, learning something new each week, and comparing the different approaches each one is taking. I’m the guy who writes this posts, but I can learn a lot with your Tiny Metaprogramming Libraries and your feedback.

 

Bring named parameters in modern C++ -- Marco Arena

By Marco Arena | Dec 16, 2014 01:06 AM | Tags: c++14 advanced

I’m going to explore some of the classical ways to emulate named parameters in C++ as well as mention new approaches. Part of this work would not have been possible without Davide Di Gennaro's help and suggestions. An entire paragraph was written by Davide.

Bring named parameters in modern C++

by Marco Arena

From the article:

In programming, named parameters refer to a computer language’s support for function calls that clearly state the name of each parameter within the function call itself.[...]Several languages support named parameters (e.g. C#, Objective-C, …). C++ does not.[...]In this post, I’m going to explore some of the classical ways to emulate named parameters in C++ as well as mention new approaches.