Re: [boost] Interprocess regexes

Subject: Re: [boost] Interprocess regexes
From: Mike Spertus (mike_spertus_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-12-06 15:25:58

Phil Endecott <spam_from_boost_dev <at> chezphil.org> writes:

> 
> Jeffrey Bosboom wrote:
> > Then I guess a better question would be, "Why don't standard library 
> > implementations properly use ::pointer?"
> 
> In 2005 I asked the GNU libstdc++ people about this, and Matt Austern replied:
> 
>      "The sticking point, and the reason why nobody has done this yet for
>    libstdc++, is that nobody has spelled out precisely what requirements
>    my_allocator<T>::pointer must satisfy. Is my_allocator::pointer
>    allowed to have a nontrivial copy constructor? Does it have to be a
>    POD?  Can you use const_cast to convert my_allocator::const_pointer to
>    my_allocator::pointer? Can you use static_cast to convert
>    my_allocator<void>::pointer to my_allocator<T>::pointer? If there's an
>    implicit conversion from D* to B*, does it necessarily follow that
>    there's an implicit conversion from my_allocator<D>::pointer to
>    my_allocator<B>::pointer?
> 
> Martin Sobor (of Dinkumware) said:
> 
>      "With user-defined
>    pointers you can't make many of the assumptions and optimizations
>    that you can otherwise. For example, you can't assume that such
>    pointer types are convertible to true pointers (such as void*),
>    you might need to be prepared to deal with exceptions where they
>    normally cannot occur, you can't use memcpy to copy objects of
>    user-defined pointers, etc.
> 
> The thread starts here: http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/libstdc++/2005-05/msg00294.html
> 
> I'm pleased to read in Mike's post that this is resolved for C++0x.  I 
> don't believe this is yet implemented in GNU libstdc++ (the bug is 
> still open).
> 
Shared memory containers are fully usable now. We just use the container
implementations provided for that purpose in Boost::interprocess, which work
just great. Our experience is that this is a mature production-quality
implementation comparable to other Boost libraries. In particular, the relative
pointer type (offset_pointer) provided by the boost::interprocess shared memory
allocators obey enough of the requirements one would expect from a pointer
replacement that the boost::interproces STL containers can use them.

I will certainly be pleased when I can use a std::map this way (actually, I
think you can with the current Dinkumware) but until then, there is absolutely
no problem with using the boost::interprocess::map reimplementation instead.

Mike