Book Image

Data Structures and Algorithms with the C++ STL

By : John Farrier
5 (2)
Book Image

Data Structures and Algorithms with the C++ STL

5 (2)
By: John Farrier

Overview of this book

While the Standard Template Library (STL) offers a rich set of tools for data structures and algorithms, navigating its intricacies can be daunting for intermediate C++ developers without expert guidance. This book offers a thorough exploration of the STL’s components, covering fundamental data structures, advanced algorithms, and concurrency features. Starting with an in-depth analysis of the std::vector, this book highlights its pivotal role in the STL, progressing toward building your proficiency in utilizing vectors, managing memory, and leveraging iterators. The book then advances to STL’s data structures, including sequence containers, associative containers, and unordered containers, simplifying the concepts of container adaptors and views to enhance your knowledge of modern STL programming. Shifting the focus to STL algorithms, you’ll get to grips with sorting, searching, and transformations and develop the skills to implement and modify algorithms with best practices. Advanced sections cover extending the STL with custom types and algorithms, as well as concurrency features, exception safety, and parallel algorithms. By the end of this book, you’ll have transformed into a proficient STL practitioner ready to tackle real-world challenges and build efficient and scalable C++ applications.
Table of Contents (30 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Part 1: Mastering std::vector
7
Part 2: Understanding STL Data Structures
13
Part 3: Mastering STL Algorithms
19
Part 4: Creating STL-Compatible Types and Algorithms
23
Part 5: STL Data Structures and Algorithms: Under the Hood

Creating custom hash functions

As we have seen, the STL offers a vast array of container classes such as std::unordered_map, std::unordered_set, and std::unordered_multiset, which rely heavily on hash functions for their efficient operation. When working with custom types, creating custom hash functions tailored to your data structures is imperative. In this section, we will learn about the significance of implementing custom hash functions, explore the characteristics of a good hash function, and provide an illustrative example of how to integrate a custom type with an STL container, using a custom hash function.

Interoperability with STL containers

STL containers such as std::unordered_map or std::unordered_set use hash tables to store and retrieve elements efficiently. To make your custom types compatible with these containers, you need to provide a way for them to compute a hash value, which is used to determine the storage location of an element within the container. Without...