Advanced C++: Master the technique of confidently writing robust C++ code

Cover....1

FM....2

Copyright....3

Table of Contents....4

Preface....16

Chapter 1: Anatomy of Portable C++ Software....24

Introduction....25

Managing C++ Projects....26

The Code-Build-Test-Run Loop....26

Building a CMake Project....27

Exercise 1: Using CMake to Generate Ninja Build Files....28

Importing a CMake Project into Eclipse CDT....31

Exercise 2: Importing the CMake File into Eclipse CDT....32

Exercise 3: Adding New Source Files to CMake and Eclipse CDT....36

Activity 1: Adding a New Source-Header File Pair to the Project....39

Unit Testing....40

Preparing for the Unit Tests....40

Exercise 4: Preparing Our Project for Unit Testing....41

Building, Running, and Writing Unit Tests....42

Exercise 5: Building and Running Tests....43

Exercise 6: Testing the Functionality of Code....49

Activity 2: Adding a New Class and Its Test....53

Understanding Compilation, Linking, and Object File Contents....55

Compilation and Linking Steps....55

Exercise 7: Identifying Build Steps....55

The Linking Step....62

Diving Deeper: Viewing Object Files....63

Exercise 8: Exploring Compiled Code....64

Debugging C++ Code....69

Exercise 9: Debugging with Eclipse CDT....70

Writing Readable Code....79

Indentation and Formatting....79

Use Meaningful Names as Identifiers....81

Keeping Algorithms Clear and Simple....83

Exercise 10: Making Code Readable....85

Activity 3: Making Code More Readable....89

Summary....91

Chapter 2A: No Ducks Allowed – Types and Deduction....94

Introduction....95

C++ Types....96

C++ Fundamental Types....96

C++ Literals....96

Specifying Types – Variables....97

Exercise 1: Declaring Variables and Exploring Sizes....99

Specifying Types – Functions....109

Exercise 2: Declaring Functions ....111

Pointer Types....113

Exercise 3: Declaring and Using Pointers ....118

Creating User Types....122

Enumerations....122

Exercise 4: Enumerations – Old and New School....127

Structures and Classes....130

Fraction Class....131

Constructors, Initialization, and Destructors....132

Class Special Member Functions....134

Implicit Versus Explicit Constructors....135

Class Special Member Functions – Compiler Generation Rules....136

Defaulting and Deleting Special Member Functions....136

Rule of Three/Five and Rule of Zero....138

Constructors – Initializing the Object....138

Exercise 5: Declaring and Initializing Fractions....141

Values Versus References and Const....143

Exercise 6: Declaring and Using Reference Types....146

Implementing Standard Operators....147

Implementing the Output Stream Operator (<<)....148

Structuring Our Code....149

Exercise 7: Adding Operators to the Fraction Class....150

Function Overloading....154

Classes, Structs, and Unions....155

Activity 1: Graphics Processing....157

Summary....160

Chapter 2B: No Ducks Allowed – Templates and Deduction....162

Introduction....163

Inheritance, Polymorphism, and Interfaces....163

Inheritance and Access Specifiers....169

Abstract Classes and Interfaces....169

Exercise 1: Implementing Game Characters with Polymorphism....170

Classes, Structs, and Unions Revisited....174

Visibility, Lifetime, and Access....175

Namespaces....178

Templates – Generic Programming....179

What is Generic Programming?....180

Introducing C++ Templates....180

C++ Pre-Packaged Templates....182

Type Aliases – typedef and using....184

Exercise 2: Implementing Aliases....185

Templates – More than Generic Programming....186

Substitution Failure Is Not An Error – SFINAE....187

Floating-Point Representations....191

Constexpr if Expressions....192

Non-Type Template Arguments....193

Exercise 3: Implementing Stringify – specialization Versus constexpr....194

Function Overloading Revisited....197

Template Type Deduction....197

Displaying the Deduced Types....198

Template Type Deduction – the Details....199

SFINAE Expression and Trailing Return Types....206

Class Templates....209

Exercise 4: Writing a Class Template....209

Activity 1: Developing a Generic "contains" Template Function....213

Summary....214

Chapter 3: No Leaks Allowed - Exceptions and Resources....216

Introduction....217

Variable Scope and Lifetime....217

Exceptions in C++....223

The Need for Exceptions....223

Stack Unwinding....229

Exercise 1: Implementing exceptions in Fraction and Stack....229

What Happens When an Exception is Thrown?....235

Throw-by-Value or Throw-by-Pointer....235

Standard Library Exceptions....236

Catching Exceptions....237

Exercise 2: Implementing Exception Handlers....239

CMake Generator Expressions....241

Exception Usage Guidelines....242

Resource Management (in an Exceptional World) ....242

Resource Acquisition Is Initialization....243

Exercise 3: Implementing RAII for Memory and File Handles....246

Special Coding Techniques....249

C++ doesn't Need finally....250

RAII and the STL....250

Who Owns This Object?....250

Temporary Objects....252

Move Semantics....252

Implementing a Smart Pointer....253

STL Smart Pointers....258

std::unique_ptr ....259

std::shared_ptr ....260

std::weak_ptr....261

Smart Pointers and Calling Functions....264

Exercise 4: Implementing RAII with STL Smart Pointers....268

Rule of Zero/Five – A Different Perspective....273

Activity 1: Implementing Graphics Processing with RAII and Move....275

When is a Function Called?....276

Which Function to Call....277

Identifiers....278

Names....278

Name lookup....279

Argument-Dependent Lookup....279

Caveat Emptor ....281

Exercise 5: Implementing Templates to Prevent ADL Issues....283

Implicit Conversion....285

Explicit – Preventing Implicit Conversion ....285

Contextual Conversion....288

Exercise 6: Implicit and Explicit Conversions ....289

Activity 2: Implementing classes for Date Calculations....293

Summary....294

Chapter 4: Separation of Concerns - Software Architecture, Functions, and Variadic Templates....296

Introduction....297

The Pointer to Implementation (PIMPL) Idiom....297

Logical and Physical Dependencies....297

The Pointer to Implementation (PIMPL) Idiom....299

Advantages and Disadvantages of PIMPL....303

Implementing PIMPL with unique_ptr<>....303

unique_ptr<> PIMPL Special Functions....306

Exercise 1: Implementing a Kitchen with unique_ptr<>....309

Function Objects and Lambda Expressions....313

Function Pointers....313

What is a Function Object?....317

Exercise 2: Implementing function objects....320

std::function<> template....322

Exercise 3: Implementing callbacks with std::function....325

What is a Lambda Expression?....328

Capturing data into Lambdas....330

Exercise 4: Implementing Lambdas....332

Variadic Templates....336

Activity 1: Implement a multicast event handler ....340

Summary....341

Chapter 5: The Philosophers' Dinner – Threads and Concurrency....344

Introduction....345

Synchronous, Asynchronous, and Threaded Execution....346

Concurrency....346

Parallelism....347

Synchronous Execution....350

Asynchronous Execution....353

Exercise 1: Creating Threads in a Different Way....359

Review Synchronization, Data Hazards, and Race Conditions....363

Exercise 2: Writing an Example of Race Conditions....365

Data Hazards....369

RAW Dependency....369

WAR Dependency....370

WAW Dependency....371

Resource Synchronization....372

Event Synchronization....375

Deadlock....378

Move Semantics for Multithreading Closures....379

Exercise 3: Moving Objects to a Thread Function....382

Exercise 4: Creating and Working with an STL Container of Threads ....386

Futures, Promises, and Async....391

Exercise 5: Synchronization with Future Results....405

Activity 1: Creating a Simulator to Model the Work of the Art Gallery....408

Summary....412

Chapter 6: Streams and I/O....414

Introduction....415

Reviewing the I/O Portion of the Standard Library....416

Predefined Standard Stream Objects....418

Exercise 1: Overriding the Left Shift Operator, <<, for User-Defined Types....420

File I/O Implementation Classes....422

Exercise 2: Reading and Writing User-Defined Data Types to a File....426

String I/O Implementation....430

Exercise 3: Creating a Function for Replacement Words in a String....432

I/O Manipulators....435

I/O Manipulators for Changing the Numeric Base of the Stream ....435

Exercise 4: Displaying Entered Numbers in Different Numeric Bases....435

I/O Manipulators for Floating-Point Formatting....439

Exercise 5: Displaying Entered Floating-Point Numbers with Different Formatting....440

I/O Manipulators for Boolean Formatting....446

I/O Manipulators for Field Width and Fill Control....447

I/O Manipulators for Other Numeric Formatting....449

I/O Manipulators for Whitespace Processing....451

Making Additional Streams....453

How to Make an Additional Stream – Composition....454

Exercise 6: Composing the Standard Stream Object in the User-Defined Class....455

How to Make an Additional Stream – Inheritance....459

Exercise 7: Inheriting the Standard Stream Object....461

Leveraging Asynchronous I/O....465

Asynchronous I/O on Windows Platforms....465

Asynchronous I/O on Linux Platforms....475

Exercise 8: Asynchronously Reading from a File in Linux....477

Asynchronous Cross-Platform I/O Libraries....482

Interaction of Threads and I/O....485

Exercise 9: Developing a Thread-Safe Wrapper for std::cout....486

Using Macros....491

Activity 1: The Logging System for The Art Gallery Simulator....493

Summary....497

Chapter 7: Everybody Falls, It's How You Get Back Up – Testing and Debugging....500

Introduction....501

Assertions....502

Exercise 1: Writing and Testing Our First Assertion....502

Static Assertions....506

Exercise 2: Testing Static Assertions....507

Understanding Exception Handling....510

Exercise 3: Performing Exception Handling ....511

Unit Testing and Mock Testing....514

Exercise 4: Creating Our First Unit Test Case....515

Unit Testing Using Mock Objects....522

Exercise 5: Creating Mock Objects....523

Breakpoints, Watchpoints, and Data Visualization....532

Working with the Stack Data Structure....533

Activity 1: Checking the Accuracy of the Functions Using Test Cases and Understanding Test-Driven Development (TDD)....547

Summary....555

Chapter 8: Need for Speed – Performance and Optimization....558

Introduction....559

Performance Measurement....559

Manual Estimation....560

Studying Generated Assembly Code....561

Manual Execution Timing....570

Exercise 1: Timing a Program's Execution....571

Timing Programs without Side Effects....575

Source Code Instrumentation....576

Exercise 2: Writing a Code Timer Class....576

Runtime Profiling....582

Exercise 3: Using perf to Profile Programs....582

Optimization Strategies....584

Compiler-Based Optimization....584

Loop Unrolling....584

Exercise 4: Using Loop Unrolling Optimizations....585

Profile Guided Optimization....587

Exercise 5: Using Profile Guided Optimization....588

Parallelization....589

Exercise 6: Using Compiler Parallelization....589

Source Code Micro Optimizations....591

Using the std::vector Container Efficiently....591

Exercise 7: Optimizing Vector Growth....592

Short-Circuit Logical Operators....596

Exercise 8: Optimizing Logical Operators....596

Branch Prediction....599

Exercise 9: Optimization for Branch Prediction....599

Further Optimizations....602

Cache Friendly Code....603

Exercise 10: Exploring the Effect of Caches on Data Structures....603

Exercise 11: Measuring the Impact of Memory Access....607

Caching....611

Prefetching....611

Effects of Caching on Algorithms....612

Optimizing for Cache-Friendliness....613

Exercise 12: Exploring the Cost of Heap Allocations....614

Struct of Arrays Pattern....617

Exercise 13: Using the Struct of Arrays Pattern....617

Algorithmic Optimizations....621

Exercise 14: Optimizing a Word Count Program....622

Activity 1: Optimizing a Spell Check Algorithm....637

Summary....640

Appendix....642

Index....754

C++ is one of the most widely used programming languages and is applied in a variety of domains, right from gaming to graphical user interface (GUI) programming and even operating systems. If you're looking to expand your career opportunities, mastering the advanced features of C++ is key.

The book begins with advanced C++ concepts by helping you decipher the sophisticated C++ type system and understand how various stages of compilation convert source code to object code. You'll then learn how to recognize the tools that need to be used in order to control the flow of execution, capture data, and pass data around. By creating small models, you'll even discover how to use advanced lambdas and captures and express common API design patterns in C++. As you cover later chapters, you'll explore ways to optimize your code by learning about memory alignment, cache access, and the time a program takes to run. The concluding chapter will help you to maximize performance by understanding modern CPU branch prediction and how to make your code cache-friendly.

By the end of this book, you'll have developed programming skills that will set you apart from other C++ programmers.