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

Resizing and reserving memory

In our exploration of std::vector, understanding how to manage its memory effectively is essential. A vector’s beauty is in its dynamism; it can grow and shrink, adapting to the ever-changing requirements of our applications. Yet, with this flexibility comes the responsibility to ensure efficient memory utilization. This section digs into the operations that let us manipulate vector sizes and their preallocated memory: resize, reserve, and shrink_to_fit.

When working with vectors, we’ve seen how their capacity (preallocated memory) might differ from their actual size (number of elements). The methods to manage these aspects can significantly affect your programs’ performance and memory footprint.

The power of resize()

Imagine you have std::vector holding five elements. If you suddenly need it to keep eight elements, or perhaps only three, how would you make this adjustment? The resize() function is your answer.

resize...