Boost is a collection of C++ libraries. Each library has been reviewed by many professional programmers before being accepted by Boost. Libraries are tested on multiple platforms using many compilers and many C++ standard library implementations. While using Boost, you can be sure that you are using one of the most portable, fast, and reliable solutions that is distributed under a license suitable for commercial and open source projects.
Many parts of Boost have been included into C++11, C++14, and C++17. Furthermore, Boost libraries will be included in the next standard of C++. You will find C++ standard-specific notes in each recipe of this book.
Without a long introduction, let's get started!
In this chapter, we will see some recipes for everyday use. We'll see how to get configuration options from different sources and what can be cooked up using some of the data types introduced by Boost library authors.