November 2008 - Boost - lists.preview.boost.org

Re: [boost] Profiling template instantiations (Steven Watanabe)
by PORKOLAB Zoltan 12 Feb '09

12 Feb '09

Hi Steven, We have created a framework for debugging/profiling template metaprograms in 2006. It might give you a few tips. It works based on the same idea you have. We instrument all template codes, both at the begining and at the end of each template we insert a special piece of code emitting warning messages of a well-defined form. Before instrumentation we create an XML file to remember the template positions in the source file. When we parse the warning, using this information we can reconstruct the instantiation stack knowing the original line numbers, identifiers, etc.. At the end we produce another XML for possible front-ends. The framework uses boost::spirit and boost::wave. We have also implemented and tested a visual studio plug-in. An overview of the whole idea: http://gsd.web.elte.hu/templight/ There is also a GPCE article about the framework, you can find it here: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1173746&coll=portal&dl=ACM&CFID=47731… or here: http://gsd.web.elte.hu/contents/articles/gpce06.pdf You can download both the VS binaries and the source from: http://people.inf.elte.hu/pocok Please feel free to use the code or any of the ideas. For technical question you can find Jozsef: jmihalicza(a)gmail.com or me. Regards, Zoltan

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[constrained_value] Review version
by Robert Kawulak 09 Feb '09

09 Feb '09

Hi all, I've made some minor changes to the Boost Constrained Value library: - reorganized the structure of header files, - renamed saturating/saturating_int into clipping/clipping_int, - using boost::swap where applicable (if you don't have it, you need to get it from http://svn.boost.org/svn/boost/branches/release/boost/utility/swap.hpp) - made no_constraint policy public, - now the stream operators are not defined if BOOST_NO_IOSFWD macro is defined, - fixed identifiers containing "__" (not allowed by C++), - fixed minor language errors in the docs. The library is ready for the formal review, which starts this monday (1.12). It is only missing the detailed regression tests, which will be added after the review. Currently the examples file (libs\constrained_value\doc\src\examples.cpp) can be used instead -- it uses most of the functionality of the library and should compile and run returning 0. As usually, the code and documentation can be downloaded here: http://rk.go.pl/f/constrained_value.zip The documentation is also available online here: http://rk.go.pl/r/constrained_value Any comments and problem reports for platforms that has not been tested yet are very welcome. Best regards, Robert Kawulak -=##############=- "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones." - Albert Einstein

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[threadpool] new version - supporting future library (C++0x) from Anthony Williams
by k-oli＠gmx.de 09 Feb '09

09 Feb '09

Hello, I've uploaded a new version of boost.threadpool (v17) at http://www.boostpro.com/vault/index.php?action=downloadfile&filename=boost-…. It uses the future implementation of Anthony Williams (C++0x - available at http://www.justsoftwaresolutions.co.uk/files/n2561 future.hpp). Please save it as file 'future'. best regards, Oliver

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Re: [boost] [date_time] Time zone improvements
by Rutger ter Borg 07 Feb '09

07 Feb '09

Jeff Garland wrote: > Very cool :-) One question -- is there a portable solution where a user > could deploy a files onto a Windows system or is it a Unix only solution? Portable, big endian binary files. The variant I'm proposing is also based on the POSIX standard http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/000095399/basedefs/xbd_chap08.html: "TZ This variable shall represent timezone information. The contents of the environment variable named TZ shall be used by the [snip] functions, and by various utilities, to override the default timezone. The value of TZ has one of the two forms (spaces inserted for clarity): :characters or: std offset dst offset, rule " The second variant is what's currently in Boost.Date_Time as Posix Time Zone, having a direct specification of the time zone. I'll be talking about the first variant, containing :characters. Although this is implementaiton specific, most POSIX-compatible systems have implemented the Zoneinfo database for this variant, e.g., Linux-based systems, many BSDs, Mac OS X, etc. The :characters point to any other zoneinfo-compatible binary file, either with an absolute or relative path. A natural step for changing Boost.Date_Time would be to make changes such that the Posix Time Zone supports both formats. I.e., variant 1) posix_time_zone( ":/etc/localtime" ); or posix_time_zone( ":/usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Amsterdam" ); variant 2) posix_time_zone( "EST-5EDT,M4.1.0,M10.5.0" ); I think both should work as it is from the same standard, and seems to be a natural and consistent starting point to look at changing the interface. Do you agree? > Actually, I believe the abstract timezone is able to support this, but > there > isn't a concrete implementation. It would be great to have the concrete > implementation to prove out the abstraction (obviously from the text below > you think there needs to be changes). As far as I can tell, the abstract time zone class currently is not able to represent variant 1): the abstract zone class is geared towards a single-lined definition of a time zone, whereas variant 1) may be regarded as a series of definitions, i.e., a map of < transition_time_point_in_utc, { gmt_offset, abbreviation, is_dst, ... } > looking up utc_to_local is a matter of doing a lower_bound search on the transition time points. The right-hand side of the map above is widely implemented with a struct called ttinfo. A proposal from my side would be to change the abstract time zone class in such way that it is able to represent both variants. The easiest approach here is probably to introduce the ttinfo structure, and make the current library working with that. variant 1): has a map of transition points, returns a (pointer to a) ttinfo structure. May hold more than 2 different ttinfo structures. variant 2): always has 2 ttinfo structures (std/dst). Uses dst-calculations/functions to lookup the transitions point, returns the right (pointer to a) ttinfo structure. What do you think? Cheers, Rutger

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[threadpool] draft n2276 - launch_in_pool
by Oliver Kowalke 25 Jan '09

25 Jan '09

Hello, I did a look into draft n2276 - a launch_in_pool function is suggested (passing task to a system provided threadpool). Is it reasonable to have a static threadpool? How many worker-threads should this pool contain and how are the submitted tasks queued (FIFO, priority order ... unlimited/limited number of tasks can bes stored). What about applications which require a pool with different configuration than the static pool provides? Is it acceptable to pay for an unused pool? regards, Oliver -- Psssst! Schon vom neuen GMX MultiMessenger gehört? Der kann`s mit allen: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/multimessenger

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[thread/interprocess] could we improve recursive_mutex constructor
by vicente.botet 24 Jan '09

24 Jan '09

Hi, the recursive_mutex constructor initialize/set/destroy the pthread_mutexattr_t every time. I'm wondering if we can improve the efficiency storing this on a static variable which will be initialized once. What could be the better way to initialize this static variable? Note: the same applies to interprocess mutexes. recursive_mutex() { // begin code that can be initialized only once pthread_mutexattr_t attr; int const init_attr_res=pthread_mutexattr_init(&attr); if(init_attr_res) { throw thread_resource_error(); } int const set_attr_res=pthread_mutexattr_settype(&attr,PTHREAD_MUTEX_RECURSIVE); if(set_attr_res) { throw thread_resource_error(); } // end code that can be initialized only once int const res=pthread_mutex_init(&m,&attr); if(res) { throw thread_resource_error(); } // begin code that can be removed BOOST_VERIFY(!pthread_mutexattr_destroy(&attr)); // end code that can be removed } Regards, Vicente

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[thread] Why the at_thread_exit cleanup function be const?
by vicente.botet 24 Jan '09

24 Jan '09

In addition, if a remove the const on operator()() struct mycallable1 { void operator()() { std::cout << "mycallable1" << std::endl; }; }; void my_thread() { std::cout << "my_thread" << std::endl; mycallable1 x; boost::this_thread::at_thread_exit(x); } I get the following error: gcc.compile.c++ ..\..\..\bin.v2\libs\interthreads\test\hello_world.test\gcc-4.3.2\debug\target-os-cygwin\threadapi-pthread\threading-multi\hello_world.o ../../../boost/thread/detail/thread.hpp: In member function `void boost::detail::thread_exit_function<F>::operator()() const [with F = mycallable1]': ..\example\hello_world.cpp:52: instantiated from here ../../../boost/thread/detail/thread.hpp:474: error: passing `const mycallable1' as `this' argument of `void mycallable1::operator()()' discards qualifiers Why the cleanup function must be const? Best, Vicente ______________________ Vicente Juan Botet Escribá

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manipulators for filtering_stream s
by Roland Schwarz 22 Jan '09

22 Jan '09

Surprisingly I was not able to find on the net code that would give me a smart way to indent a stream. So I wrote a little filter based on the boost iostreams library. My first attempt was: boost::iostreams::filtering_ostream out; indent_filter ind(4); out.push(ind); out.push(std::cout); However trying to control it via e.g. ind.in() ind.out() turns out to be problematic interface since, 1) out.push() takes a copy of ind 2) the interface ind.in() is suboptimal. With my attached example it is possible to: #include "indent.hpp" ... boost::iostreams::filtering_ostream out; indent_filter::push(out,2); out.push(std::cout); ... And use it like so: out << "Hello Filter!\n" << indent_in << "this is\n" << "indented\n" << indent_out << "until here\n" ; Which will result in output: Hello Filter! this is indented until here The state is stored in the ios base class of the stream, by way of the pword mechanism. Consequently the filter stream even may be downcast to a basic_ostream, and the indenter will still work. E.g. with out defined as above: ... foo(out); ... void foo(std::ostream& out) { out << indent_in << "out is a downcast filter_stream\n" << indent_out << "end of indentation\n" ; } If you want to try it out, you just need to include the header indent.hpp. If someone thinks the snippet is usable either as an example for the iostreams library or the filter streams manipulator idea is worth generalizing to make it usable for other filters too, I would be glad to hear from you. -- _________________________________________ _ _ | Roland Schwarz |_)(_ | aka. speedsnail | \__) | mailto:roland.schwarz@chello.at ________| http://www.blackspace.at

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[thread] proposal to manage portable and non portable thread attributes
by vicente.botet 22 Jan '09

22 Jan '09

Hello, Boost.thread has already a non portable interface to get the thread handle class thread { public: ... typedef np_native_handle_type native_handle_type; native_handle_type native_handle(); ... }; Boost.Thread do not allow to pass thread attributes on the thread constructor. I supose that this is due to portable issues. Could we identifiy which attributes are portable and which one not? The portable attributes (as stack size, ...) can be grouped on a thread_attributes class. In order to be able to pass whatever attribute to the thread constructor we can add the setting of non portable attributes to this thread_attributes class, and making the thread constructor take a thread_attributes in addition to the existing parameters. class thread { public: class thread_attributes { // portable attributes public: // set/get of attributes // .. #if defined(BOOST_THREAD_PLATFORM_WIN32) // ... window version #elif defined(BOOST_THREAD_PLATFORM_PTHREAD) private: pthread_attr_t native_attributes; public: set_np_attributes(const pthread_attr_t* h); // ... other #else #error "Boost threads unavailable on this platform" #endif }; thread(const thread_attributes*p, F f,A1 a1); ... }; The portable application needing some specific configuration can construct portable threads using the following schema thread::thread_attributes attr; // set portable attributes // ... #if defined(BOOST_THREAD_PLATFORM_WIN32) // ... window version #elif defined(BOOST_THREAD_PLATFORM_PTHREAD) // ... pthread version pthread_attr_t native_attributes; pthread_attr_init(&native_attributes); pthread_attr_setstacksize(&native_attributes, 1000000); attr.set_np_attributes(&native_attributes); #else #error "Boost threads unavailable on this platform" #endif thread th(attr, f,ctx); What do you think? Vicente

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[MultiIndex] STL algorithm support for multi_index_containers
by Arno Schödl 31 Dec '08

31 Dec '08

Hello, we have added support for using multi_index ordered index iterators in lieu of random access iterators in standard algorithms that require sorted ranges, e.g. lower_bound, upper_bound, equal_range, and binary_search. This is useful when using these iterators in generic algorithms that internally call lower_bound/upper_bound/etc. Our implementation is attached. We are currently overloading std::lower_bound/... which is illegal. I propose introducing a boost::lower_bound/..., where we can ignore the C++ standard restriction, and where the standard implementation forwards to std::lower_bound. Runtime is O(log N), where N is the total number of elements in the container, rather than, as it would be optimal, the number of elements within the (sub)range on which the algorithm is called. The problem is that the red-black tree nodes do not store the tree level number, so we cannot find the parent node that encompasses the whole subrange in linear time. I am not sure this is practically relevant. In any case, using the sortedness of the tree rather than treating the iterators as arbitrary bidirectional iterators is a step forward. Any opinions? Regards, Arno -- Dr. Arno Schoedl · aschoedl(a)think-cell.com Technical Director think-cell Software GmbH · Invalidenstr. 34 · 10115 Berlin, Germany http://www.think-cell.com · phone +49-30-666473-10 · toll-free (US) +1-800-891-8091 Directors: Dr. Markus Hannebauer, Dr. Arno Schoedl · Amtsgericht Charlottenburg, HRB 85229

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