Book Image

Hands-On Design Patterns with C++

By : Fedor G. Pikus
Book Image

Hands-On Design Patterns with C++

By: Fedor G. Pikus

Overview of this book

C++ is a general-purpose programming language designed with the goals of efficiency, performance, and flexibility in mind. Design patterns are commonly accepted solutions to well-recognized design problems. In essence, they are a library of reusable components, only for software architecture, and not for a concrete implementation. The focus of this book is on the design patterns that naturally lend themselves to the needs of a C++ programmer, and on the patterns that uniquely benefit from the features of C++, in particular, the generic programming. Armed with the knowledge of these patterns, you will spend less time searching for a solution to a common problem and be familiar with the solutions developed from experience, as well as their advantages and drawbacks. The other use of design patterns is as a concise and an efficient way to communicate. A pattern is a familiar and instantly recognizable solution to specific problem; through its use, sometimes with a single line of code, we can convey a considerable amount of information. The code conveys: "This is the problem we are facing, these are additional considerations that are most important in our case; hence, the following well-known solution was chosen." By the end of this book, you will have gained a comprehensive understanding of design patterns to create robust, reusable, and maintainable code.
Table of Contents (21 chapters)

The Visitor pattern

The Visitor pattern stands out from the other classic object-oriented patterns due to its complexity. On the one hand, the basic structure of the Visitor pattern is quite complex and involves many coordinated classes that must work together to form the pattern. On the other hand, even the description of the Visitor pattern is complex—there are several very different ways to describe the same pattern. Many patterns can be applied to multiple kinds of problems, but the Visitor pattern goes beyond that—there are several ways to describe what it does that use completely different languages, talk about seemingly unrelated problems, and overall have nothing in common. However, they all describe the same pattern. Let's start by examining the many faces of the Visitor pattern, and then move on to the implementation.

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