Is there anyway to write the following as a C++ macro?

Question

my_macro << 1 << "hello world" << blah->getValue() << std::endl;

should expand into:

std::ostringstream oss;
oss << 1 << "hello world" << blah->getValue() << std::endl;
ThreadSafeLogging(oss.str());

Answer 1

#define my_macro my_stream()
class my_stream: public std::ostringstream  {
public:
    my_stream() {}
    ~my_stream() {
        ThreadSafeLogging(this->str());
    }
};
int main() {
    my_macro << 1 << "hello world" << std::endl;
}

A temporary of type my_stream is created, which is a subclass of ostringstream. All operations to that temporary work as they would on an ostringstream.

When the statement ends (ie. right after the semicolon on the whole printing operation in main()), the temporary object goes out of scope and is destroyed. The my_stream destructor calls ThreadSafeLogging with the data "collected" previously.

Tested (g++).

Thanks/credits to dingo for pointing out how to simplify the whole thing, so I don't need the overloaded operator<<. Too bad upvotes can't be shared.

Answer 2

Couldn't you just derive from ostream and provide your own thread safe implementation? Then you could just do

myCOutObject << 1 << "hello world" << blah->getValue() << std::endl;

And get the exact same functionality without macros and using C++ properly?

Answer 3

No. The problem is that without using function syntax, a macro is limited to only being replaced where it is.

But if you were willing to use function syntax, you can then replace stuff both before and after the args.

my_macro(1 << "hello world" << blah->getValue() << std::endl);

You could by defining MyMacro as:

#define my_macro(args) std::ostreamstring oss; \
                       oss << args; \
                       ThreadSafeLogging(oss.str());

Answer 4

Take a look at google-glog, they do this using a temporary object instanciated with a

LOG(INFO) << "log whatever" << 1;

and they also have other interesting macros such as LOG_IF et al.

Answer 5

Considering you have these lines included somewhere in your code, yes it is possible

#include <iostream>
#include <sstream> 

__LINE__ macro is defined by all standart compilers. So we can use it to generate a variable name wich is different each time you use the macro :)

Here is a new version that is seen as a one-statement instruction only: (EDITED)

#define Var_(Name, Index) Name##Index
#define Var(Name, Index) Var_(Name, Index)
#define my_macro \
for (struct { int x; std::ostringstream oss; } Var(s, __LINE__) = { 0 }; \
     Var(s, __LINE__).x<2; ++Var(s, __LINE__).x)  \
    if (Var(s, __LINE__).x==1) ThreadSafeLogging(Var(s, __LINE__).oss.str()); \
    else Var(s, __LINE__).oss

// So you can use it like this 
int main() 
{ 
    if (4 != 2)
        my_macro << 4 << " hello "  << std::endl; 
    my_macro << 2 << " world !" << std::endl; 
} 

Developper probably won't need to use this macro twice on same line becasue of simplicity of operator <<. But in case you need this, you can switch the use of __LINE__ by __COUNTER__ (which is non standard!). Thanks to Quuxplusone for this tip

Answer 6

Here's another nasty trick I saw somewhere else. It has a significant disadvantage compared to my other answer: you can't use it twice in the same scope because it declares a variable. However, it may still be interesting for other cases where you want to have somemacro foo run something after foo.

#define my_macro \
    std::ostringstream oss; \
    for (int x=0; x<2; ++x) \
        if (x==1) ThreadSafeLogging(oss.str()); \
        else oss

int main() {
    my_macro << 1 << "hello world" << std::endl;
}

Answer 7

The logging setup I have is quite similar:

bool ShouldLog(const char* file, size_t line, Priority prio);

class LoggerOutput : public std::stringstream {
public:
  LoggerOutput(const char* file, size_t line, Priority prio) 
  : prio(prio) 
  {
    Prefix(file, line, prio);
  }
  void Prefix(const char* file, size_t line, Priority prio);
  ~LoggerOutput() {
    Flush();
  }
  void Flush();
private:
  Priority prio;
};

#define LOG(Prio) if (!Logging::ShouldLog(__FILE__, __LINE__, Prio)) {} else Logging::LoggerOutput(__FILE__, __LINE__, Prio)

If your logging is disabled, the ostream is never created and little overhead exists. You can configure logging on file name & line number(s) or priority levels. The ShouldLog function can change between invocations, so you could throttle or limit output. The log output uses two functions to modify itself, Prefix that adds a "file:line: (PRIO) " prefix to the line, and Flush() which both flushes it to the log output as a single command and adds a newline to it. In my implementation it always does, but you can make that conditional if one is not already there.