Re: [Boost-users] [uuid] to string problem

Subject: Re: [Boost-users] [uuid] to string problem
From: Andy Tompkins (atompkins_at_[hidden])
Date: 2010-05-11 09:00:33

< snip >
> >>
> >> string GeneratorUtils::getRandomID()
> >> {
> >>
> >> random_generator gen; 
> >> uuid u = gen();
> >>
> >> return u.uuid_to_string(); // ERROR 
> >> }
> >>
> >> It does not accept any to_string() function. Is there a way to
> >> convert from uuid to string in C++? (by the way, I can use the
> >> other things such as date d, uuid u etc.)
> > 
> > see
> > http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/1_43_0/libs/uuid/uuid.html#boost/uuid/uuid_io.hpp
> > 
> > one can also use lexical_cast eg: 
> > uuid u; 
> > string s = lexical_cast<string>(u); 
> >
> > I'll update the documentation to include this example.
>
> By the way. Andy, do you plan to implement to_string() member-function
> or standalone function? AFAIK lexical_cast has a lot of overhead :(

Hmm, I haven't really given it much thought.  Since it doesn't need to 
be a member function, I would lean toward a standalone function.  Do 
any other libraries have a similar function?  I would likely create:

template <typename C, typename T, typename A>
std::basic_string<C, T, A> to_basic_string(boost::uuids::uuid const& u);

as well as,

std::string to_string(boost::uuids::uuid const& u);
std::wstring to_wstring(boost::uuids::uuid conts& u);

Regards,
Andy.