Re: [boost] why no boost::ostream_itearator?

From: garcia (garcia_at_[hidden])
Date: 2003-12-04 18:59:25

John Torjo wrote:

> Dear boosters,
>
> I browsed the sandbox, but could not find a simpler ostream_iterator.
> The thing is that I don't like the fact that when writing using an 
> ostream_iterator I have to provide the value_type I'm writing.
> This is both tedios and error prone.
>
> Example:
>
> std::copy( vs.begin(), vs.end(),
>   std::ostream_iterator<std::string>(std::cout, " "));
>                         ^^^ tedious and error prone.
>
> This should not be necessary since it can be deduced at the time of 
> writing.
>
> I wrote a small helper. Any interest in adding it to boost?

At least from my perspective, the only thing I tend to use 
ostream_iterator for is to stream a container of stuff to std::cout, or 
the like, as you do above.  A while back I wrote some helpers so that 
the syntax becomes more like:

std::cout << "Stuff follows:\n" << stream_range(vs.begin(),vs.end(),",") 
<< "\n";

I like this a lot better, though I must admit that ostream_iterator is a 
little more flexible.  But I usually use this kind of thing for 
debugging or personal programming projects.

Cheers,

ron