November 2013 - Boost - lists.preview.boost.org

[asio] Bug: Handlers execute on the wrong strand.
by Greg Barron 04 Apr '14

04 Apr '14

Hi All, I would like to refer you to this bug report: https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/ticket/9203 I won't paste the full contents of the bug report into this message. The executive summary is that the allocation algorithm for the implementation of asio::strand can and does allocate the implementation of an existing strand to strands that are subsequently allocated. This can have the effect that handlers wrapped in strand (b) will actually be executed on strand (a). I consider this to be a bug but if there is something that I'm misunderstanding about the operation of strands it would be great if you could help me clear it up. If the consensus is that this is a bug, what are the chances for it to be included in the 1.56 release? It is probably too late to be included in the 1.55 release. I've implemented a work around which could only be described as a hack and would be embarrassed to show it to anybody. But it gets me over my hump :). Thanks! -- Greg

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Post-git forking process
by Sohail Somani 29 Mar '14

29 Mar '14

Hey all, Often, I find bugs in Boost that I need to patch manually before the next release. What I used to do before was keep a copy of Boost in my source tree which made this easier: just patch it directly. This made it easy to modify, but annoying to post patches and honestly, they just got lost most of the time. With Git, it should become easier to contribute said patches as well as pull in whichever particular changes I need. However when I attempted such a fork recently, I was a bit lost. As I understood it, the process should have been: 1. Create a fork of https://github.com/boostorg/boost and use this fork in my project 2. Create a fork of the library/libraries I wanted to patch 3. Update the submodules in my boostorg/boost fork to point to my forked libraries 4. Post a pull request for the respective libraries. Once the changes have been accepted, point back to the official boostorg repo I failed terribly, no doubt due to PEBKAC. Is there a chance that someone could write a tutorial or a how-to guide for the recommended process of forking Boost with Git? The main thing I need is the ability to have a patched version of Boost that I can use while the patches are being reviewed/accepted/rejected. Thanks, Sohail

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sqlpp11: SQL for C++
by Roland Bock 06 Feb '14

06 Feb '14

Hi, over the last four or five years I developed several SQL libraries for C++. With C++11 I was finally able to create an SQL library that meets my own expectations and requirements. It is being used in production, I recently put it on github, and I would really like to hear from you guys whether this is something that could be interesting for you personally or for boost? https://github.com/rbock/sqlpp11 https://github.com/rbock/sqlpp11/wiki sqlpp11 is a template library representing an embedded domain specific language (EDSL) that allows you to * define types representing tables and columns, * construct type safe queries checked at compile time for syntax errors, type errors, name errors and even some semantic errors, * interpret results by iterating over query-specific structs with appropriately named and typed members. This results in several benefits, e.g. * the library user operates comfortably on structs and functions, * the compiler reports many kinds of errors long before the code enters unit testing or production, * the library hides the gory details of string construction for queries and interpreting string based results returned by select calls. I.e. you don't need to use strings in query construction where you wouldn't use them in SQL and there is no need to use positional arguments or to parse strings when obtaining fields from a result row (the latter being true unless you do not know which columns to select at compile time). The library supports both static and dynamic queries. The former offers greater benefit in terms of type and consistency checking. The latter makes it easier to construct queries on the flight. Specific traits of databases (e.g. unsupported or non-standard features) are known at compile time as well. This way, the compiler can tell the developer at compile time if a query is not accepted by the database (e.g. if a feature is missing). And the library can form the query in the correct manner, for instance if the engine uses concat instead of operator|| to concatenate strings. Two Examples: ============= Static Select: -------------- // selecting zero or more results, iterating over the results for (const auto& row : db.run( select(foo.name, foo.hasFun) .from(foo) .where(foo.id > 17 and foo.name.like("%bar%")))) { if (row.name.is_null()) std::cerr << "name will convert to empty string" << std::endl; std::string name = row.name; // text fields are implicitly convertible to string bool hasFun = hasFun; // bool fields are implicitly convertible to bool } Dynamic Select: ---------------- auto s = dynamic_select(db, tab.foo).dynamic_columns().from(tab); if (userWantsBar) s.add_column(tab.bar); for(const auto& row : run(s)) { std::cerr << "row.foo: " << row.foo; if (userWantsBar) std::cerr << "row.bar" << row.at("bar"); std::cerr << std::endl; }; Please let me know your questions/thoughts/suggestions/rants. Contributions welcome, of course :-) Regards, Roland

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Interest in Base2/16/32/64 Encoding Library?
by Thomas Kemmer 27 Jan '14

27 Jan '14

Dear Boost Developers, I would like to know if there is interest in incorporating a generic Base2/16/32/64 encoding library into Boost. I am the author of such a libray, hosted at http://code.google.com/p/stlencoders/ and would be willing to contribute and make the effort of "Boostifying" it, if the Boost community is interested in such a thing. There have been several suggestions for a Base64 encoding library on this mailing list in the past. Most of them have been dismissed, since Boost already provides a Base64 implementation with Boost.Serialization's "Dataflow Iterators". Though I appreciate the dataflow iterator's design, from personal experience I think that for the basic task of encoding/decoding, a higher-level interface, e.g. one that takes padding and intermittent whitespace (MIME) into account, would benefit many developers. Currently, the stlencoders library - implements the Base16, Base32 and Base64 encoding schemes as defined in RFC 4648. Base2, i.e. binary encoding, is also supported. - implements encoding and decoding operations as generic algorithms that operate on STL-style iterators - supports different encoding alphabets using custom traits classes - supports different character types - lets the user define if/which non-alphabet characters should be ignored via predicates - provides reasonable performance that matches most "plain C" implementations stlencoders is currently designed as a stand-alone library with no dependencies on Boost (or anything but C++03); it would therefore take some effort and guidance from the community to properly integrate it with the rest of Boost. I would therefore appreciate any feedback regarding your interest in this. Kind Regards, Thomas

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C++03 and C++11 ABI compatibility for compiled libraries
by Andrey Semashev 24 Jan '14

24 Jan '14

Hi, I would like to raise the issue of binary compatibility of compiled Boost libraries between C++03 and C++11. I faced this problem with gcc on Linux, but other compilers and platforms may be affected as well. To summarize the problem: * Most, if not all Linux distributions build packages in C++03 mode. This is also the default in gcc. * Some Boost libraries conditionally use C++11 features in their binary interfaces (see [1] as an example). This makes C++03 and C++11 versions of the library binary incompatible. * Given that, users are unable to use C++11 in their code that uses Boost because of linker failures. I don't have the complete list of the offending C++11 features that break ABI, but it would seem that at least scoped enums and rvalue references are among them. Are there any more? I would like to hear opinions on the possible course of action to tackle this problem. Currently, I see 2 choices: 1. Avoid using C++11 features in binary interfaces. This may also mean avoiding STL types in binary interfaces, if they differ between C++03 and C++11 (I didn't verify that). This is my suggested hotfix solution for Boost.Filesystem [1] and the approach I took in Boost.Log. Obviously, this cripples code and error prone, but it keeps a single binary that can be used from any flavor of C++ on the user's side. 2. Compile different versions of Boost libraries, for each supported C++ version. The C++ version should be encoded into the library file names, so that different versions can coexist. This would require changes in Boost.Build and autolinking support code, but I think this would be a better long-term solution. Opinions? [1] https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/ticket/6779

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Re: [boost] Is there interest in a collection of call stack utilities?
by Aurelian Melinte 14 Jan '14

14 Jan '14

Hello, To follow up on the discussion https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/boost-developers-archive/PSwTBEEe0Ao I was not clear if there is interest for it or not. I went ahead and the first cut of the code is now at https://github.com/melintea/Boost-Call_stack Please feel free to take a look and comment. Regards, Aurelian

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Removing support for old compilers
by Joaquin M Lopez Munoz 14 Jan '14

14 Jan '14

Hi Stephen As part of your initiative of removing support for old compilers, are you building somewhere a change log in the form of either a list of compiler deficiencies or compiler versions no longer supported? I understand this should be inserted in a prominent place on the Boost 1.56 release notes and can serve as a reference for lib maintainers reviewing your patches (tracking changesets is harder and commit messages are not always completely illuminating). Thank you, Joaquín M López Muñoz Telefónica Digital

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[block_ptr] & Java
by Phil Bouchard 14 Jan '14

14 Jan '14

Hello everyone, In a quest to speed up my Android applications and knowing Java is written in C++, I decided to discuss with the OS community openjdk.java.net to try to introduce them block_ptr. But the conversation was dead in the water probably due to the lack of developers. So I just have questions: - Does anybody know if Java uses Boost? - block_ptr hasn't been reviewed yet but memory management is an important subject. Are there unanswered questions about it? Sincerely, -Phil Experiment proposal to refute Special Relativity for the interested: http://finitetheory.com/files/experiment.pdf

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[Macro]Test Case grouping using Traits
by Hemanth Choudary M V (RBEI/ETA1) 13 Jan '14

13 Jan '14

Hello, I have observed that in native unit test framework(c++), there is an option to group test cases using attributes which are reflected as traits in the Test Explorer window in MS VS2012. Following is a an example of the same: BEGIN_TEST_METHOD_ATTRIBUTE(TestMethod3) TEST_OWNER(L"SuperMan") TEST_PRIORITY(2) TEST_METHOD_ATTRIBUTE(L"Category",L"Slow") END_TEST_METHOD_ATTRIBUTE() TEST_METHOD(TestMethod3) { Assert::AreEqual(2,6); } How can this be achieved via Boost Unit Test Library? Are there macros to achieve the same? Mit freundlichen Grüßen / Best Regards, Hemanth Choudary MV RBEI/ETA1

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[Test] Problems with debug::break_memory_alloc
by Fredrik Orderud 13 Jan '14

13 Jan '14

I have a problem with the memory-leak detection logic in boost.test. What happens when unit_test::framework::init starts up on Windows is that memory-leak detection is first explicitly activated. Secondly, debug::break_memory_alloc is called with a value (default is 1). Activation of leak detection is great, but to always override the allocation number to break on is not necessary a good idea if the user has already set a value from a debugger. In my case I am investigating a leak from a static member allocated prior to main and/or boost.test being invoked. In that case, I need to break the program early to be able to set the allocation number to break on. This works well by itself, but it's _very_ confusing when boost.test afterwards replaces my allocation number with a default value. Could it be possible to modify boost.test, so that it only modifies the allocation number to break on if the user has explicitly requested to break on a given allocation? Thanks in advance, Fredrik Orderud

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