View Source: Boost - Waikato Linux Users Group

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Boost is an interesting set of [C++] libraries that can be found at [http://www.boost.org/]. It provides all sorts, from lambda functions to regular expressions. A full list of the libraries included can be found at [http://www.boost.org/libs/libraries.htm].

Boost is an example of some of the amazing things which can be accomplised with templates and C++. A few examples shamelessly ripped from the documentation.

----

Lambda functions:

 list<int> v(10);
 for_each(v.begin(), v.end(), _1 = 1);

The expression _1 = 1 creates a lambda functor which assigns the value 1 to every element in v.

 vector<int*> vp(10);
 sort(vp.begin(), vp.end(), *_1 > *_2);

In this call to sort, we are sorting the elements by their contents in descending order.

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Yes, this is still [C++]. For those interested in Python, perhaps Boost.Python is somewhat useful:

C++ code:

 struct World
 {
     World(std::string msg): msg(msg) {} // added constructor
     void set(std::string msg) { this->msg = msg; }
     std::string greet() { return msg; }
     std::string msg;
 };

And exporting the class:

 #include <boost/python.hpp>
 using namespace boost::python;

 BOOST_PYTHON_MODULE(hello)
 {
     class_<World>("World", init<std::string>())
         .def("greet", &World::greet)
         .def("set", &World::set)
     ;
 }

And what it is like in Python:

 >>> import hello
 >>> planet = hello.World()
 >>> planet.set('howdy')
 >>> planet.greet()
 'howdy'

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Not all compilers are able to compile Boost. An interesting read is [http://www.boost.org/status/compiler_status.html] where there are tests done on each compiler to see whether they are able to compile all the boost test cases.

Boost used a modified Jam as its build system rather than Makefiles.

One page links to Boost:

StandardTemplateLibrary

Last edited on Thursday, February 27, 2003 1:01:09 pm by SamJansen

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