Re: [boost] Interest in a statically initialized map?

From: meadori_at_[hidden]
Date: 2006-06-29 17:35:08

> I suppose static maps will make a lot of sense if you need to deal
> with it in template metaprogramming or even preprocessing...
> Otherwise, it's just another way of implementing a simple map.
They make sense in other ways as well. For the scenario static_map
is trying to solve you only want the map initialized once. I guess you
could use boost.assign with a static object. Or you could right your own
init code. For example:
   // namespace scope
   struct name_age_map {
      std::map<std::string, int> map;
      name_age_map() {
         this->map["Will"] = 28;
         this->map["Joe"]  = 30;
      }
   };
   static name_age_map my_map;

   // class scope
   class foo {
      static name_age_map my_map;
   };
   name_age_map foo::my_map;

   // function scope
   void bar() {
      static name_age_map my_map;
   }
I have three gripes about this solution:
   1. The scaffolding code is a pain to write over and over
   2. It is not thread safe
   3. You may not want to pay the runtime initialization cost
        if the map is huge
.

A static_map would solve all these problems. And possibly more?

--Meador