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

Manipulating vectors

Vectors in C++ are dynamic arrays that not only store data but offer a suite of operations to manipulate that data, especially when paired with the algorithms provided by the STL. These algorithms allow developers to optimize data movement and transformation tasks with elegance. Let’s delve into the art of manipulating std::vector with some powerful algorithms.

Transforming with std::copy

Imagine you’ve got one vector and wish to copy its elements to another. Simple looping might come to mind, but there’s a more efficient and expressive way: std::copy.

Consider two vectors as shown in the following code:

std::vector<int> source = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
std::vector<int> destination(5);

Copying the elements is as straightforward as shown in the following:

std::copy(source.begin(), source.end(), destination.begin());

destination holds {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}. It’s worth noting that the destination vector should have enough...