Book Image

Template Metaprogramming with C++

By : Marius Bancila
5 (1)
Book Image

Template Metaprogramming with C++

5 (1)
By: Marius Bancila

Overview of this book

Learn how the metaprogramming technique enables you to create data structures and functions that allow computation to happen at compile time. With this book, you'll realize how templates help you avoid writing duplicate code and are key to creating generic libraries, such as the standard library or Boost, that can be used in a multitude of programs. The introductory chapters of this book will give you insights into the fundamentals of templates and metaprogramming. You'll then move on to practice writing complex templates and exploring advanced concepts such as template recursion, template argument deduction, forwarding references, type traits, and conditional compilation. Along the way, you'll learn how to write variadic templates and how to provide requirements to the template arguments with C++20 constraints and concepts. Finally, you'll apply your knowledge of C++ metaprogramming templates to implement various metaprogramming patterns and techniques. By the end of this book, you'll have learned how to write effective templates and implement metaprogramming in your everyday programming journey.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
1
Part 1: Core Template Concepts
5
Part 2: Advanced Template Features
9
Part 3: Applied Templates
Appendix: Closing Notes

Chapter 2: Template Fundamentals

In the previous chapter, we saw a short introduction to templates. What they are, how they are helpful, pros and cons for using templates, and, also, a few examples of function and class templates. In this chapter, we will explore this area in detail, and look at aspects such as template parameters, instantiation, specializations, aliases, and more. The main topics that you will learn about from this chapter are as follows:

  • How to define function templates, class templates, variable templates, and alias templates
  • What kinds of template parameters exist?
  • What is template instantiation?
  • What is template specialization?
  • How to use generic lambdas and lambda templates

By the end of this chapter, you will be familiar with the core fundamentals of templates in C++ and be able to understand large areas of template code and also write templates by yourself.

To start this chapter, we will explore the details of defining and...