Time to start using C++0x?

Time to start using C++0x?

Karadoc ~~

Member #2,749

September 2002

I'm curious about how many people are already making use of the new features in c++0x.

I've kind of been avoiding it, because of concerns about stability, portability, and efficiency. But I think it's probably reached the stage where portability is the only problem left, and it's just a matter of time before that gets cured too.

So, I'm tempted to go through some of my code and replace this:

boost::ptr_map<PlayerID, Player>::iterator it;
for (it = player_table.begin(); it != player_table.end(); ++it)
{
  ...
}

with this:

for(auto it : player_table)
{
  ...
}

It certainly looks a lot cleaner, and is easier to write. So what do you think? Is it time to take the plunge?

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Arthur Kalliokoski

Second in Command

February 2005

It kind of reminds me of this:

http://www.matthewleverton.com/

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

Oscar Giner

Member #2,207

April 2002

It depends. For code that you don't care if others are able to compile or not, just use all C++0x features your chosen compiler implements. For projects where you do care about that, use a minimum common denominator. So if you are ok by requiring gcc 4.5 and MSVC10 you can use most major c++0x features. But a lot of minor ones, mostly syntactic sugar ones (like your example, since MSVC10 doesn't support range-based for-loop yet Append: And you need at least gcc 4.6 it seems, and the lastest mingw version is still 4.5.2), won't be there for some compiler or the other.

Myself I can't live without auto anymore. It makes working with iterators so much cleaner.

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bamccaig

Member #7,536

July 2006

Oscar Giner said:

Myself I can't live without auto anymore. It makes working with iterators so much cleaner.

I can certainly understand this. I primarily program in C# and the equivalent keyword is var. Now I only declare the variable type when I'm not initializing it. I almost wish the language designers would take it to the next step and infer the type from the first assignment (and error if used before then, which I think C# would do regardless). And of course, error if any subsequent assignment is of an incompatible type.

--
I mean the best with what I say. It doesn't always sound that way.

Karadoc ~~

Member #2,749

September 2002

Oscar Giner said:

Append: And you need at least gcc 4.6 it seems, and the lastest mingw version is still 4.5.2), won't be there for some compiler or the other.

I'm using MinGW 4.6. I got it from here.

Unfortunately, Qt Creator (the IDE I'm using) apparently doesn't know the syntax highlighting for range for.

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orz

Member #565

August 2000

I'm a bit nervous about C++0x. I was still regularly finding bugs in MSVC & gcc support of vanilla C++ until just the last 5 years or so, and I don't really want to have to go through that again. Though auto does sound pretty swell.

AMCerasoli

Member #11,955

May 2010

Karadoc ~~ said:

rtunately, Qt Creator (the IDE I'm using) apparently doesn't know the syntax highlighting for range for.

It doesn't allow you to customize it?

This is an IDE:

{"name":"604139","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/d\/e\/de2250ecdb1918f2a6f79cb3983c9a42.png","w":564,"h":832,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/d\/e\/de2250ecdb1918f2a6f79cb3983c9a42"}

Karadoc ~~

Member #2,749

September 2002

AMCerasoli said:

It doesn't allow you to customize it?

As I understand it, there are two types of syntax highlighting built into Qt Creator. One is just the bare basics: it highlights keywords a particular colour, strings another colour, number, comments, and so on. The other type is a bit more complex - it actually checks that the code is well formed. It will highlight code that tries to use an undeclared variable, or tries to include a file that the IDE can't find, and so on. For just the colour stuff, you can download different definition files for different languages and edited them as you like them. But I don't think the other stuff is customisable.

In other news, I was a bit disappointed to find that std::bind doesn't work as well as boost::bind. At least, it isn't a drop-in replacement. std::bind apparently couldn't work out which function I was trying to bind arguments to because the function was overloaded. boost::bind had no problem with the same function.

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SiegeLord

Member #7,827

October 2006

I'll start using it when it becomes the default on GCC. I use D 90% of the time, so I've had many of the C++0x features for years now...

"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow."-Ecclesiastes 1:18
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AMCerasoli

Member #11,955

May 2010

What web pages are you using to see the new features? I downloaded a PDF file from the official web page (I think) but it has 1300 pages an it says:

Quote:

This document is not an ISO International Standard. It is distributed for review and comment. It is subject
to change without notice and may not be referred to as an International Standard.
Recipients of this draft are invited to submit, with their comments, notification of any relevant patent rights
of which they are aware and to provide supporting documentation.
Document type:

I would like to check out the official documents, but ISO.org is way too big...

Who has the Bjarne Stroustrup's phone number?

Surt

Member #273

April 2000

AMCerasoli said:

What web pages are you using to see the new features?

I find this to be handy: http://www2.research.att.com/~bs/C++0xFAQ.html

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Karadoc ~~

Member #2,749

September 2002

The page Surt linked to is my main source of information about C++0x.

Anyway. I've started using c++0x features, and they are mostly good. I started with auto and range for, which make iterating through container elements much neater and easier. I then decided that since I'm using c++0x anyway, I might as well replace NULL with nullptr - not really a big deal. Then I remembered enums. I've posted on a.cc a couple of times to talk about how I'd like to use enums if they weren't broken... And now in c++0x they are fixed!

I'm also using constexpr, which allows me to initialize static class constants in a sane looking way.

So yeah, things are going well.

The only thing I'm kind of disappointed about is that the c++0x standard library isn't living up to my expectations. As I mentioned earlier std::bind doesn't work as well as boost::bind, and the threads stuff, including std::mutex etc., doesn't work at all on my version of MinGW. So far, the new standard library just seems to be a weak and incomplete version of boost. But I expect that to improve in later version of MinGW.

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