I have a pointer-like struct that goes in the place of a pointer. The difference with a pointer is that it has extra information that the (also special) allocator can use to deallocate the memory.
This pointer-like structure works well for all basic uses.
I can allocate and deallocate memory, dereferrence, increment,->, etc.
Now I want to use this pointers to be managed by a STL-like container.
Early on, I realized that STL vector basically cannot handle non-raw pointers.
T* is too hard coded, and the standard basically rules out anything that is not a pointer.
Inspired by Boost.Interprocess' offset_ptr<T> I decided to use Boost.Container vector, which is very customizable and in principle can manage anything, the allocator passed to the boost::container::vector can handle anything that is pointer-like.
Now the class boost::container::vector<T, myallocator_with_special_pointer<T>> can do anything... except resize()!!
Looking at the code in boost/container/vector.hpp it seems that the process of resizing (which is basically and allocation, followed by a copy (or move) and deallocation) involves raw pointers.
The offending line is:
[line 2729:] T * const new_buf = container_detail::to_raw_pointer
(allocator_traits_type::allocate(this->m_holder.alloc(), new_cap, this->m_holder.m_start));
Which is later followed by
[line 3022:] this->m_holder.start(new_start); // new_start is the same as new_buf above.
// member ::start(pointer&) will need to convert a raw pointer to the pointer typedef.
Both lines absolutely kill the possibility of using anything that is not a raw_pointer. Even if I have a conversion operator to a raw pointer, other information about the special pointer will be lost.
It seems pretty silly that this small detail forbids the use of non-raw pointers. Given all the effort for the container to be general (e.g. defining the pointer typedef), why this portion of the code uses T* just for resizing?
In other words, why Boost Container doesn't use this line instead
[alternative] pointer const new_buf =
allocator_traits_type::allocate(this->m_holder.alloc(), new_cap, this->m_holder.m_start);
Is there a workaround or an alternative way to use Boost Container vector to handle non-raw pointers?
Boost.Container says in its manual page http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/1_64_0/doc/html/container/history_and_reasons.html#container.history_and_reasons.Why_boost_container
Boost.Container is a product of a long development effort that started in 2004 with the experimental Shmem library, which pioneered the use of standard containers in shared memory. Shmem included modified SGI STL container code tweaked to support non-raw
allocator::pointertypes and stateful allocators. Once reviewed, Shmem was accepted as Boost.Interprocess and this library continued to refine and improve those containers.
The current implementation (in the context of resize) goes against this design goal.
I asked a less specific question here, about other traits of the allocators: Is it still possible to customize STL vector's "reference" type?
For reference the allocator that specifies the special pointer (which is propagated to the container) is something like this,
template<class T>
struct allocator{
using value_type = T;
using pointer = array_ptr<T>; // simulates T*
using const_pointer = array_ptr<T const>; // simulates T const*
using void_pointer = array_ptr<void>; // simulates void*
using const_void_pointer = array_ptr<void const>; // simulates void const*
some_managed_shared_memory& msm_;
allocator(some_managed_shared_memory& msm) : msm_(msm){}
array_ptr<T> allocate(mpi3::size_t n){
auto ret = msm_.allocate(n*sizeof(T));
return static_cast<array_ptr<T>>(ret);
}
void deallocate(array_ptr<T> ptr, mpi3::size_t = 0){
msm_.deallocate(ptr);
}
};
Full working code http://coliru.stacked-crooked.com/a/f43b6096f9464cbf
#include<iostream>
#include <boost/container/vector.hpp>
template<typename T>
struct array_ptr;
template<>
struct array_ptr<void> {
using T = void;
T* p;
int i; //some additional information
// T& operator*() const { return *p; }
T* operator->() const { return p; }
// operator T*() const { return p; }
template<class TT>
operator array_ptr<TT>() const{return array_ptr<TT>((TT*)p, i);}
operator bool() const{return p;}
array_ptr(){}
array_ptr(std::nullptr_t) : p(nullptr){}
array_ptr(T* ptr, int _i) : p(ptr), i(_i){}
template<class Other>
array_ptr(array_ptr<Other> other) : p(other.p), i(other.i){}
};
template<>
struct array_ptr<void const> {
using T = void const;
T* p;
int i; //some additional information
// T& operator*() const { return *p; }
T* operator->() const { return p; }
operator T*() const { return p; }
array_ptr(){}
array_ptr(std::nullptr_t) : p(nullptr){}
array_ptr(T* ptr, int _i) : p(ptr), i(_i){}
template<class Other>
array_ptr(array_ptr<Other> other) : p(other.p), i(other.i){}
};
template<typename T>
struct array_ptr {
T* p;
int i; //some additional information
T& operator*() const { return *p; }
T* operator->() const { return p; }
T& operator[](std::size_t n) const{
assert(i == 99);
return *(p + n);
}
bool operator==(array_ptr const& other) const{return p == other.p and i == other.i;}
bool operator!=(array_ptr const& other) const{return not((*this)==other);}
// operator T*() const { return p; }
array_ptr& operator++(){++p; return *this;}
array_ptr& operator+=(std::ptrdiff_t n){p+=n; return *this;}
array_ptr& operator-=(std::ptrdiff_t n){p-=n; return *this;}
array_ptr operator+(std::size_t n) const{array_ptr ret(*this); ret+=n; return ret;}
std::ptrdiff_t operator-(array_ptr const& other) const{return p - other.p;}
array_ptr(){}
array_ptr(std::nullptr_t) : p(nullptr), i(0){}
operator bool() const{return p;}
array_ptr(T* ptr, int _i) : p(ptr), i(_i){}
array_ptr(T* ptr) : p(ptr), i(0){}
array_ptr(int) : p(nullptr), i(0){}
array_ptr(array_ptr<void> const& other) : p(static_cast<T*>(other.p)), i(other.i){}
};
struct some_managed_shared_memory {
array_ptr<void> allocate(size_t n) { return array_ptr<void>(::malloc(n), 99); }
void deallocate(array_ptr<void> ptr) { if (ptr) ::free(ptr.p); }
};
template<typename T>
struct allocator{
using value_type = T;
using pointer = array_ptr<T>; // simulates T*
using const_pointer = array_ptr<T const>; // simulates T const*
using void_pointer = array_ptr<void>; // simulates void*
using const_void_pointer = array_ptr<void const>; // simulates void const*
some_managed_shared_memory& msm_;
allocator(some_managed_shared_memory& msm) : msm_(msm){}
array_ptr<T> allocate(size_t n){
auto ret = msm_.allocate(n*sizeof(T));
return static_cast<array_ptr<T>>(ret);
}
void deallocate(array_ptr<T> ptr, std::size_t = 0){
msm_.deallocate(ptr);
}
};
int main() {
some_managed_shared_memory realm;
boost::container::vector<int, allocator<int> > v(10, realm);
assert( v[4] == 0 );
v[4] = 1;
assert( v[4] == 1 );
for(std::size_t i = 0; i != v.size(); ++i) std::cout << v[i] << std::endl;
for(auto it = v.begin(); it != v.end(); ++it) std::cout << *it << std::endl;
// none of these compile:
v.push_back(8);
assert(v.size() == 11);
v.resize(100);
std::cout << v[89] << std::endl; // will fail an assert because the allocator information is lost
//v.assign({1,2,3,4,5});
}
