Re: [boost] radix sort

Subject: Re: [boost] radix sort
From: Steven Ross (spreadsort_at_[hidden])
Date: 2013-07-22 06:33:04

>
> Use a function template, don't implement the primary specialization. Just
> implement the specializations you support. If you dispatch to a static
> member function of a class template, PTS with type traits can give wider
> support without specializing for otherwise similar types. (all integral
> types, for example).
>

Won't the user have to give their class a trait to use the function, if it
isn't a raw integer type?
The other concern is that the integer and string algorithms are different
in terms of
worst-case performance, as the string algorithm has to deal with
variable-length inputs.

Currently there is a spread_sort wrapper that selects integers or floats
using PTS,
and failing that, defaults to std::sort.  I've yet to see a way to identify
that a data type is string-like.
I can remove the fallback if that's the desired behavior
(to avoid confusing the user about which algorithm is in use), but that
doesn't resolve the string issue.