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Schedule for ACCU 2016 has been published

By Mantosh Kumar | Apr 17, 2016 09:45 PM | Tags: None

The schedule for the annual ACCU Conference has just been published. The conference will be held at Marriott Hotel  City Centre, in Bristol, UK, on April 19-23, 2016. The conference is focused on professionalism in programming, but as always the schedule contains a lot of talks about C++.

 

ACCU is a small and friendly conference, typically 400+ attendees living together in the same hotel for a week discussing everything about programming. Most of the talks(60+) are 90 minutes, with long breaks inbetween, inviting to deep and insightful discussions both during and after the sessions. If you are into programming, especially C++, this is a conference that you might want to consider.

 

 

Overload 132 is now available

By Adrien Hamelin | Apr 12, 2016 01:59 PM | Tags: intermediate community

ACCU’s Overload journal of April 2016 is out. It contains the following C++ related articles.

Overload 132

From the journal:

The Tao of Scratch
Scratch is an environment designed to help young people learn to code. Patrick Martin walks us through it. by Patrick Martin

Knowledge-Sharing Architects As An Alternative to Coding Architects
Should architects write code? Sergy Ignatchenko explores this controversial subject. by Sergey Ignatchenko

QM Bites: Understand Windows OS Identification Preprocessor Macros
There’s confusion between user-defined and predefined Windows 32/64-bit operating-system identification macros. Matthew Wilson shines light on the issue. by Matthew Wilson

Why Collaboration is Key for QA Teams in an Agile World
Agile processes can have an impact on QA departments. Greg Law considers how they can adapt to survive and even thrive. by Greg Law

How to Diffuse Your Way Out of a Paper Bag
Diffusion models can be used in many areas. Frances Buontempo applies them to paper bag escapology. by Frances Buontempo

Stufftar
How do you quickly transfer data from one machine to another? Ian Bruntlett shows us the bash script he uses. by Ian Bruntlett

QM Bites: looping for-ever
Never-ending loop constructs can confound user and compiler in subtle ways. Matthew Wilson offers advice to maximise portability and transparency.

Using Enum Classes as Bitfields
Scope enums have many advantages over standard enums. Anthony Williams shows how to use them as bitmasks. by Anthony Williams

9.7 Things Every Programmer Really, Really Should Know
Most of us have heard of the twelve step program. Teedy Deigh introduces a 9.7 step plan for programmers.

Quick Q: Is Stephen Lavavej's Mallocator the same in C++11?

By Adrien Hamelin | Apr 12, 2016 11:41 AM | Tags: intermediate c++11

Quick A: No, it has changed.

Recently on SO:

Is Stephen Lavavej's Mallocator the same in C++11?

STL himself has an answer to this question in his STL Features and Implementation techniques talk at CppCon 2014 (Starting at 26'30).

The slides are on github.

I merged the content of slides 28 and 29 below:

#include <stdlib.h> // size_t, malloc, free
#include <new> // bad_alloc, bad_array_new_length
template <class T> struct Mallocator {
  typedef T value_type;
  Mallocator() noexcept { } // default ctor not required
  template <class U> Mallocator(const Mallocator<U>&) noexcept { }
  template <class U> bool operator==(
    const Mallocator<U>&) const noexcept { return true; }
  template <class U> bool operator!=(
    const Mallocator<U>&) const noexcept { return false; }

  T * allocate(const size_t n) const {
      if (n == 0) { return nullptr; }
      if (n > static_cast<size_t>(-1) / sizeof(T)) {
          throw std::bad_array_new_length();
      }
      void * const pv = malloc(n * sizeof(T));
      if (!pv) { throw std::bad_alloc(); }
      return static_cast<T *>(pv);
  }
  void deallocate(T * const p, size_t) const noexcept {
      free(p);
  }
};

Note that it handles correctly the possible overflow in allocate.

Course: Boost Your Productivity with Modern C++ -- Peter Gottschling

By Blog Staff | Apr 9, 2016 03:18 PM | Tags: None

peter-gottschling.jpgA repeat of last year's popular course, again being held in English and German:

Boost Your Productivity with Modern C++

by Peter Gottschling

Abstract:

Templates (generic programming)

  • Function templates
  • Class templates
  • Variadic Templates (C++11)
  • Concepts
  • Specialization
  • Template arguments that are not types
  • Functors
  • Lambda functions (C++11)

Standard Template Library

  • Iterator concept
  • Containers
  • Functions
  • Meta-programming
  • Let the compiler compute
  • Providing type informations
  • Auto and decltype (C++11)
  • Const-adaptive classes
  • Expression templates

Other advanced and new techniques

  • Calling functions from derived classes without overhead
  • RValues and move semantics (C++11)
  • Initialization lists (C++11)
  • New for-loops (C++11)

Peter Gottschling is author of the Matrix Template Library 4, co-author of the Boost Graph Library and other scientific libraries. He is vice-chair of DIN's programming language group and head of the German delegation in the ISO committee for C++ standardization. He is managing director of SimuNova and taught C++ at TU Dresden, TU Berlin and Indiana University.

Quick Q:Is it possible in C++ to iterate over a std::map with unpacked key and value?

By Adrien Hamelin | Apr 8, 2016 01:05 PM | Tags: intermediate experimental

Quick A: An easy solution is not supported by the standard, it may come later.

Recently on SO:

Is it possible in C++ to do std::map<> “for element : container” iteration with named variables (eg, key and value) instead of .first and .second?

You could write a class template:

template <class K, class T>
struct MapElem {
    K const& key;
    T& value;

    MapElem(std::pair<K const, T>& pair)
        : key(pair.first)
        , value(pair.second)
    { }
};

with the advantage of being able to write key and value but with the disadvantage of having to specify the types:

for ( MapElem<int, std::string> kv : my_map ){
    std::cout << kv.key << " --> " << kv.value;
}

And that won't work if my_map were const either. You'd have to do something like:

template <class K, class T>
struct MapElem {
    K const& key;
    T& value;

    MapElem(std::pair<K const, T>& pair)
        : key(pair.first)
        , value(pair.second)
    { }

    MapElem(const std::pair<K const, std::remove_const_t<T>>& pair)
        : key(pair.first)
        , value(pair.second)
    { }
};

for ( MapElem<int, const std::string> kv : my_map ){
    std::cout << kv.key << " --> " << kv.value;
}

It's a mess. Best thing for now is to just get used to writing .first and .second and hope that the structured bindings proposal passes, which would allow for what you really want:

for (auto&& [key, value] : my_map) {
    std::cout << key << " --> " << value;
}