June 2017 - Boost - lists.boost.org

[yap] Re-announcing Yap
by Zach Laine 23 Feb '18

23 Feb '18

I posted 2-3 months ago about Yap, an expression template library I've written that I intend to propose for Boost. This is just a reminder that the library exists, and where to find it. I'm giving a talk about it at C++Now 2017, and some time after that I intend to submit it to the queue. Louis Dionne has offered to serve as review manager when the time comes. You can find the main repo on GitHub: https://github.com/tzlaine/yap And online docs are here: https://tzlaine.github.io/yap Zach

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A GUI Library
by jinhao 09 Nov '17

09 Nov '17

Hi, all I am developing a GUI library, it takes aim at easy-to-use and portable library for modern C++ methods. The project at http://stdex.sourceforge.net A git repository at http://nanapro.codeplex.com A brief at http://nanaproject.wordpress.com/2011/12/16/preliminary-study-of-nana-c-lib… Is there any interest in this library? Regards Jinhao

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Asciidoc, an alternative for documentation
by Peter Dimov 12 Oct '17

12 Oct '17

I've been experimenting with Asciidoc-based documentation, using Boost.Assert as my guinea pig. The good thing about Asciidoc is that Github shows a preview and you can edit it directly on github.com. This is how the source looks there: https://github.com/boostorg/assert/blob/feature/asciidoc/doc/index.adoc https://github.com/boostorg/assert/blob/feature/asciidoc/doc/assert.adoc https://github.com/boostorg/assert/blob/feature/asciidoc/doc/current_functi… This is how the generated HTML documentation looks, using the default stylesheet, without any customizations on my part: https://rawgit.com/boostorg/assert/feature/asciidoc/doc/html/assert.html And this is how the generated PDF looks: http://pdimov.com/tmp/assert.pdf The tool that produces these is Asciidoctor, http://asciidoctor.org/ .

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[concurrent] Fast, lock-based queue implementation
by David Stone 29 Jul '17

29 Jul '17

I have written a new concurrent queue that has a focus on high throughput. You can check it out here: https://github.com/davidstone/concurrent-queue Some highlights of this queue: * The bulk interface is faster than other queues for many common load patterns * Almost any element type is supported with very few requirements * Supports any number of producers * Supports any number of consumers (although it works best with only one) * Can dynamically grow and shrink in memory as needed * The interface allows for very little undefined behavior: for the most part, as long as your special member functions like move constructors do not reference the queue you are inserting into, you are fine * Interface based on the pattern of moving values in and returning values via return, rather than other queues which use reference output parameters * Header-only * Design should be fairly straightforward to verify for correctness * Compiles warning free with a very high warning level on gcc and clang * Does not have any errors under ubsan, asan, or tsan I would like to submit this for inclusion in Boost if people find it interesting and useful, but first I would like to get some feedback on the design, implementation, documentation, tests, etc. I have tested this exact version on Gentoo Linux under clang 4.0 and gcc 6.3.0. I will be testing out Visual Studio 2015 and 2017 in the near future to ensure there have not been any regressions. I have run fundamentally the same queue on Visual Studio 2012 (no longer supported due to C++14 features), Visual Studio 2015 (Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012), gcc 4.9.1 (Red Hat 6 under developer toolset 3), gcc 4.9.2 (Red Hat 7), and clang 3.9.0 (Red Hat 7) for several years now with no issues, so it is a fairly mature design.

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Proposal for moving Boost to CMake
by David Sankel 27 Jul '17

27 Jul '17

Howdy all, This is a request for comments on a possible path for migrating Boost's build system to CMake. I am not speaking for the Boost Program Committee here, but I plan on bringing this up with them after getting feedback. The motivation is simple. CMake is currently the dominant player in the area of open-source, cross-platform, C++ build-systems. I make this claim based on Google trends graphs and discussions with others at the conferences I attend (CppCon, C++Now, and ISO C++ meetings). If we make Boost buildable and usable out-of-the-box with CMake, we would significantly lower the barriers to entry for both Boost users and new Boost developers. Boost serves the greater C++ community and making Boost more accessible would be of great utility. * To ease the migration path, both Boost.Build (the current jam-based build system) and CMake will be supported for a time. * Boost sources would provide a compatible, drop-in replacement for the 'FindBoost' module that is distributed with CMake. A CMake-based application could point to it and, instead of using the system Boost libraries, Boost targets would be built from source as part of the user build. * The built Boost **binaries** would also provide a compatible, drop-in replacement for the 'FindBoost' module distributed with CMake. The behavior is similar to the previous bullet, except the built binaries would be used instead of the source code. * The style of the 'CMakeLists.txt' files would follow current best practice. We'd resist the temptation to write macros which replace the core CMake functions. There would be repetition in the files, to be sure, but I think we should avoid attempting to innovate CMake. I've seen this fail on many occasions and would like to keep our goal focused, at this point, on migrating Boost to CMake. In the future we could revisit this. * There would be a list of CMake guidelines that we'd use. * Boost libraries should be buildable in isolation and use 'find_package(Boost...)' to discover their Boost dependencies. * We would work with CMake towards eventually taking over maintenance of the FindBoost module distributed with CMake. I see this progressing with several milestones. 1. Release of a CMake-buildable Boost and the CMake conventions. In this stage each Boost library can be built in isolation or with the entire distribution and all the 'FindBoost' functionality mentioned above would be incorporated. 2. The unit tests for all Boost libraries are incorporated into CTest (the CMake unit test orchestration tools). 3. The Boost infrastructure is modified to use CTest for unit testing. 4. Unit testing functionality is removed from Boost.Build. 5. Boost.Build is removed. Although there are many other great ideas floating around (e.g. modularization of Boost, Boost-Classic, and Boost2), I'd like to keep this focused on CMakification of Boost because I think it is something that would have big impact and is small enough to be doable. One question that is going to come up is "who is going to do all this work?". Once we decide on a direction, I don't foresee a problem making this happen. Between volunteers, the importance this project has for companies, and the Steering Committee reserves, we should have the resources necessary. Another concern is that some authors may resist. Authors have a lot of leeway when it comes to how they maintain their libraries, what conventions they use, and backwards compatibility concerns. However, there are some things that authors need to conform to, such as our current Boost.Build build and testing infrastructure. I liken this to the development of a city: building developers can make their buildings however they want, but the streets, which control transit between buildings, are centrally regulated. Thanks for your consideration. -- David Sankel

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[Safe Numerics] Review
by John Maddock 09 Jul '17

09 Jul '17

OK, here's my review of Robert's library. By way of something different, I've tried to not read the docs (though I ended up scanning them in the end) and just tried to use the library. Here's what I've found: 1) Using: safe<int>(-1) & 1 I get a hard assert failure at safe_base_operations.hpp:1373. I'm assuming that this is a mistake, and the usual error handlers should be called? Bitwise or has the same issue. More tests required ;) 2) I'm not sure if this is an msvc issue but in: constexpr safe_base operator~() The static assert is triggered for *unsigned types* and not for signed. Even if this is a compiler issue, it indicates a missing test case or two. 3) If I assign a float to an integer, then I get the error: "conversion of integer to float loses precision" which isn't quite what you meant to say. More particularly, for float conversions I would expect: * Conversion from a float holding an integer value that's within the range of the target type to always succeed. * Conversion from a float holding a non-integral value to conditionally succeed (with trunction) depending on the policy in effect. * Conversion *to* a float may also fail if the integer is outside the range of the float (no checking may be required if the number of bits in the integer is less than the number of bits in the float). 4) Is constexpr arithmetic supposed to be supported? I tried: constexpr boost::numeric::safe<int> j = 0; constexpr boost::numeric::safe<int> k = 3; constexpr boost::numeric::safe<int> l = j + k; Which generates an internal compiler error for msvc, and for gcc-5.3 I get: ../../../include/safe_base_operations.hpp:332:35: error: call to non-constexpr function ‘void boost::numeric::dispatch(const boost::numeric::checked_result<R>&) [with EP = boost::numeric::throw_exception; R = int]’ dispatch<exception_policy>(r); Similarly if I try to add a literal to a safe<int>. Again as the tests all pass, so I'm assuming they're missing constexpr tests? 5) What is the purpose of class safe_literal? constepxr initialization seems to work just fine without it? 6) In the docs, the example of using error handler dispatch is nonesense (top of page 41)? 7) Related to the above, I see the need to be able to define your own primitives which behave just like yours. The example I have is for bit-scan-left/right which has as precondition that the argument is non-zero, but there are other bit-fiddling operations (bit count etc) which some folks may require. A "cookbook" example would be good. 8) In the tests, you have an undocumented function "log" in the library. Not sure if this is intended to be part of the API or not, but IMO it's misnamed. ilog2 seems to a semi-standard name for this. 9) By way of testing the libraries performance I hooked it into the Millar-Rabin primality test in the multiprecision lib (test attached, it counts how many probable primes there are below 30000000), here are the times for msvc: Testing type unsigned: time = 17.6503 seconds count = 1857858 Testing type safe<unsigned>: time = 83.5055 seconds count = 1857858 Testing type 32-bit cpp_int: time = 36.9026 seconds count = 1857858 and for GCC-MINGW-5.3.0: Testing type unsigned: time = 17.1037 seconds count = 1857858 Testing type unsigned: time = 18.4377 seconds count = 1857858 Testing type unsigned: time = 21.0592 seconds count = 1857858 I'm surprised by the difference in times between msvc and gcc, also deeply impressed that there is effectively no performance penalty with GCC (I was expecting there should be some!) 10) I don't find the scope of the library over-broad, in fact I probably find it about right wrt the policies etc. 11) There were a few traits and such that it would be nice to have, the problem as ever, is what to call them and where to put them: * A trait for extracting the underlying type of a safe<> - use case for example where you enable_if a function on is_safe so don't have the template argument list to safe<>. * Do we need a function for extracting the underlying type of a safe<>? Or is casting to the underlying type optimal? Actually, maybe having a function would negate the need for the above trait, as we could just write 'auto x = mysafe.value();' ? * Do we need traits equivalent to is_signed/is_unsigned/make_signed/make_unsigned? My gut feeling is yes we do, the issue is what to call them, and where to put them - we're not allowed to specialize the type_traits versions (either boost or std), but we would need a central "one true trait" version that can be specialized by other libraries as well (Multiprecision for example). We've backed ourselves into a corner over this I fear! 12) When calling boost::integer::gcd/lcm the sub-optimal(?) non-binary versions are called for safe<> - you might want to look into seeing what traits need to be defined to ensure that the same version as the underlying type is called. Those are all the issues I can see for now... in conclusion, as for whether the library should be accepted, yes I believe it should be, modulo the issues above. Regards, John. --- This email has been checked for viruses by AVG. http://www.avg.com

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[sort] pdqsort mini-review
by Steven Ross 09 Jul '17

09 Jul '17

The (mini) review for pdqsort will start tomorrow 6/21, and run through 6/30. I will manage the review; Orson Peters is the author. The proposed boost source is here: https://gist.github.com/orlp/24f27aada1ed724d1809b372c33eb92e Documentation is here: https://github.com/orlp/pdqsort#pdqsort And a draft paper is here: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1-vl-dPgKm_T0Fxeno1a0lGT0E If you're interested, please answer these questions: 1. Are there any specific concerns you have about pdqsort vs. std::sort? 2. Does it compile for you when you try to use it as a replacement for std::sort? 3. How does the performance compare on your system vs. std::sort? 4. Do you think we should include pdqsort in Boost.Sort? 5. Do you have any concerns about switching the default/fallback sort in Boost libraries (including Boost.Sort) from std::sort to pdqsort?

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[CallableTraits] Review results
by Louis Dionne 07 Jul '17

07 Jul '17

Dear Boost, I am pleased to announce that the CallableTraits library is CONDITIONALLY ACCEPTED into Boost. I counted the following formal reviews: - Bruno Dutra: Yes - Emil Dotchevski: Yes - John P. Fletcher: Yes - Klemens Morgenstern: Yes - Peter Dimov: Yes - Zach Laine: Yes The following people also participated to the review by providing informal feedback: - Edward Diener - Gavin Lambert - Niall Douglas - Paul Fultz II - Tim Song I also based my decision on previous experience I've had using the library, and some issues we faced in the Standard Committee where we could have used CallableTraits. I'd like to thank everyone who participated to the review for their feedback, and also Barrett Adair for his submission. The following lists the conditions for acceptance, and also summarizes the general feedback received during the review. GitHub issues are leveraged to make the tracking of these comments easier. Below, whenever I refer to #XYZ, the corresponding ticket can be found at https://github.com/badair/callable_traits/issues/XYZ To see all the issues that were discussed during the review, you can search for tickets labeled with `review` on GitHub (please allow some time for Barrett to update the new issues I just filed): https://github.com/badair/callable_traits/issues?page=1&q=+label%3Areview Conditions for acceptance ------------------------- The following are points that must be addressed for the library to be accepted. Once all of the associated GitHub issues are closed, I ask that the author post to this list with links to the closed issues. Unless major problems (having to do with the closed issues) are raised at that time, the library will be automatically accepted into Boost, no additional review required. - The library needs to clearly document the advantages of CallableTraits over FunctionTypes. Concrete examples must be given (at least one, preferably two). See #117. - The level of C++ conformance required for the whole library needs to be clearly stated in the documentation. Individual components should only document divergences from that base level of conformance. The current state of things is quite confusing for users. See #118. - The "algorithmic" parts of the library must be removed, since they are out of scope. This has already been partly done in issue #114, but the following algorithms must be discussed too (let's follow up in #114): + args_at + clear_args + pop_front_args + push_front_args + expand_args_right + expand_args_left - The lazy metafunctions and predicate traits should be SFINAE-friendly, just like the aliases are. I think this inconsistency is a big deal, enough to be a condition for acceptance. See #134. Summary of the feedback received -------------------------------- The following is a compilation of other points that were made during the review, but which are not requirements for acceptance. I trust, but do not require, that all of those points will be considered by the author: - There is a loss of information with the `args` metafunction. For example, `void(T)` and `void(T, ...)` both give the same result. See #132. - Consider adding a way of obtaining the parameter list of a function without the type of `*this`. See #133. - The documentation uses the terms of art "implementation defined" and "undefined behavior" incorrectly. See #103 and #131. - The non-reference documentation should present at least one real-world use case. See #116. - The library should handle top-level cv-qualifiers. See #106. - Consider supporting different calling conventions (e.g. `__cdecl`). See #102. - Consider adding a pre-C++17 implementation of `is_invocable` and friends. See #119. - The documentation should clearly state that the library can be used without the rest of Boost. See #99. - Consider combining `expand_args` and `args` into a single metafunction with a default "output" parameter of `std::tuple`. See #126. - Consider adding `make_fn` and `make_mem_fn` metafunctions to construct a signature from a return type and a tuple of the arguments. See #113. - Consider renaming some traits, like `is_reference_member`. See #108. - Reword some parts of the documentation that look odd due to the use of passive tense. See #105. - Consider adding a version of `apply_member_pointer` which carries cv-qualifiers. See #138. - Consider adding `remove_member_cv_ref` and `copy_member_cv_ref`. See #139. - Why does `qualified_parent_class_of` always returns a const& for PMDs? See #112. - Why does `qualified_parent_class_of` return a ref-qualified type even for unqualified PMFs? See #112. A few of my own comments: - Consider using alphabetical order in the table of contents of the reference. See #135. - Consider renaming `apply_member_pointer` to something like `make_member`. See #136. - Consider dropping the `parent_` in `parent_class_of`, or adding a note to justify the name. See #137. Again, thanks to everyone who participated in the review, and congratulations to Barrett for his work! Regards, Louis Dionne

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[xpressive] Merge PR for fixing MSVC 14.1
by Andrey Semashev 04 Jul '17

04 Jul '17

Hi, There is this PR from Daniela Engert to fix Boost.Xpressive compilation failure with MSVC 14.1: https://github.com/boostorg/xpressive/pull/4 It replaces the removed std::unary_function with the equivalent typedefs. The change looks rather harmless. Could this PR be merged before 1.65 is out? Thanks.

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[iterator][range] BoostIteratorTraversalConcepts-aware boost::advance/distance
by Michel Morin 04 Jul '17

04 Jul '17

Hi, The Boost iterator traversal concepts have not been adopted by the C++ Standard. Because of this, some of RandomAccessTraversalIterators (Boost's concepts) are treated as InputIterators (Standard's concepts) by the stdlib. IMHO, Boost.Iterator should provide BoostIteratorTraversalConcepts-aware `boost::advance` and `boost::distance` to avoid the inefficiencies. However, neither of them are implemented. (Boost.Range has `boost::distance` for ranges, but it just calls `std::distance`.) I'm attaching files that implement `boost::advance` and `boost::distance`. Would these functions be useful additions? Regards, Michel

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