After few weeks break, I'm trying to expand and extend my knowlege of templates with the book Templates – The Complete Guide by David Vandevoorde and Nicolai M. Josuttis, and what I'm trying to understand at this moment is explicit instantiation of templates.
I don't actually have a problem with the mechanism as such, but I can't imagine a situation in which I would like or want to use this feature. If anyone can explain that to me I will be more than grateful.
ベストアンサー1
If you define a template class that you only want to work for a couple of explicit types.
Put the template declaration in the header file just like a normal class.
Put the template definition in a source file just like a normal class.
Then, at the end of the source file, explicitly instantiate only the version you want to be available.
Silly example:
// StringAdapter.h
template<typename T>
class StringAdapter
{
public:
StringAdapter(T* data);
void doAdapterStuff();
private:
std::basic_string<T> m_data;
};
typedef StringAdapter<char> StrAdapter;
typedef StringAdapter<wchar_t> WStrAdapter;
Source:
// StringAdapter.cpp
#include "StringAdapter.h"
template<typename T>
StringAdapter<T>::StringAdapter(T* data)
:m_data(data)
{}
template<typename T>
void StringAdapter<T>::doAdapterStuff()
{
/* Manipulate a string */
}
// Explicitly instantiate only the classes you want to be defined.
// In this case I only want the template to work with characters but
// I want to support both char and wchar_t with the same code.
template class StringAdapter<char>;
template class StringAdapter<wchar_t>;
Main
#include "StringAdapter.h"
// Note: Main can not see the definition of the template from here (just the declaration)
// So it relies on the explicit instantiation to make sure it links.
int main()
{
StrAdapter x("hi There");
x.doAdapterStuff();
}