Re: [boost] [Proposal] Adding CPUID Library in Boost

Subject: Re: [boost] [Proposal] Adding CPUID Library in Boost
From: Gaetano Mendola (mendola_at_[hidden])
Date: 2012-12-12 03:04:18

On 12/12/2012 07.45, Andrey Semashev wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 7, 2012 at 7:48 PM, Shakti Misra
> <shakti.misra.study_at_[hidden]> wrote:
>> Hi All,
>> Any interest in a cross platform CPU ID library? For a application I wanted
>> to get the CPUID mostly to check the SSE2 status. So I missed it in Boost.
>> So any interest for it?
>> I am currently evaluating the library
>> http://libcpuid.sourceforge.net/
>> This has a permissive license that I think can go with the Boost license.
>> I mailed the author also, although he does not use boost, he told he can
>> give any fixes or support needed.
>
> I would find this library useful, although I have already implemented
> a similar library for my closed project. I remember considering a few
> open alternatives when I was deciding whether to write my own
> implementation or not and I didn't find a suitable one. Libcpuid looks
> promising but apparently lacks CPU cache parameters detection (LLC
> size, cache line size and prefetch size would be very useful).
>
> I'm not sure that Boost implementation should be based on an external
> library. Libcpuid seems to be x86-only while I would prefer Boost
> library to be easily extensible to other architectures. I know not
> every architecture provides a cpuid-like operation but there probably
> are other means.
>
> I'm not particularly geared towards a header-only or compiled
> implementation. My main requirement is that it should be lightweight
> to include.

Does it make sense to add to a not platform dependent library a very 
platform dependent feature?

Basically what I'm reading is: I have several version of the same
algorithm using different cpu features, after having spent a lot of time
to write/test all of them then now I need a cpuid provided by boost.

It's sound like eating an entire donkey and then leave the tail out.

Regards
Gaetano Mendola