I know there have been some good solutions, but alternatively If your values are going to be known at compile time, instead of a switch statement you can use constexpr with a static function template and a couple of enumerators; it would look something like this within a single class:
#include <iostream>
class ColorInfo {
public:
enum ColorRecipient {
CR_0 = 0,
CR_1,
CR_2
};
enum ColorType {
CT_0 = 123,
CT_1 = 234,
CT_2 = 345
};
template<const uint8_t Iter>
static constexpr uint16_t updateColor() {
if constexpr (Iter == CR_0) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_0 << '\n';
return CT_0;
}
if constexpr (Iter == CR_1) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_1 << '\n';
return CT_1;
}
if constexpr (Iter == CR_2) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_2 << '\n';
return CT_2;
}
}
};
int main() {
const uint16_t colorRecipient0 = ColorInfo::updateColor<ColorInfo::CR_0>();
const uint16_t colorRecipient1 = ColorInfo::updateColor<ColorInfo::CR_1>();
const uint16_t colorRecipient2 = ColorInfo::updateColor<ColorInfo::CR_2>();
std::cout << "\n--------------------------------\n";
std::cout << "Recipient0: " << colorRecipient0 << '\n'
<< "Recipient1: " << colorRecipient1 << '\n'
<< "Recipient2: " << colorRecipient2 << '\n';
return 0;
}
The cout statements within the if constexpr are only added for testing purposes, but this should illustrate another possible way to do this without having to use a switch statement provided your values will be known at compile time. If these values are generated at runtime I'm not completely sure if there is a way to use constexpr to achieve this type of code structure, but if there is I'd appreciate it if someone else with a little more experience could elaborate on how this could be done with constexpr using runtime values. However, this code is very readable as there are no magic numbers and the code is quite expressive.
-Update-
After reading more about constexpr it has come to my attention that they can be used to generate compile time constants. I also learned that they can not generate runtime constants but they can be used within a runtime function. We can take the above class structure and use it within a runtime function as such by adding this static function to the class:
static uint16_t colorUpdater(const uint8_t input) {
// Don't forget to offset input due to std::cin with ASCII value.
if ( (input - '0') == CR_0)
return updateColor<CR_0>();
if ( (input - '0') == CR_1)
return updateColor<CR_1>();
if ( (input - '0') == CR_2)
return updateColor<CR_2>();
return updateColor<CR_2>(); // Return the default type
}
However I want to change the naming conventions of the two functions. The first function I will name colorUpdater() and this new function that I just shown above I will name it updateColor() as it seems more intuitive this way. So the updated class will now look like this:
class ColorInfo {
public:
enum ColorRecipient {
CR_0 = 0,
CR_1,
CR_2
};
enum ColorType {
CT_0 = 123,
CT_1 = 234,
CT_2 = 345
};
static uint16_t updateColor(uint8_t input) {
if ( (input - '0') == CR_0 ) {
return colorUpdater<CR_0>();
}
if ( (input - '0') == CR_1 ) {
return colorUpdater<CR_1>();
}
if ( (input - '0') == CR_2 ) {
return colorUpdater<CR_2>();
}
return colorUpdater<CR_0>(); // Return the default type
}
template<const uint8_t Iter>
static constexpr uint16_t colorUpdater() {
if constexpr (Iter == CR_0) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_0 << '\n';
return CT_0;
}
if constexpr (Iter == CR_1) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_1 << '\n';
return CT_1;
}
if constexpr (Iter == CR_2) {
std::cout << "ColorData updated to: " << CT_2 << '\n';
return CT_2;
}
}
};
If you want to use this with compile time constants only you can use it just as before but with the function's updated name.
#include <iostream>
int main() {
auto output0 = ColorInfo::colorUpdater<ColorInfo::CR_0>();
auto output1 = ColorInfo::colorUpdater<ColorInfo::CR_1>();
auto output2 = ColorInfo::colorUpdater<ColorInfo::CR_2>();
std::cout << "\n--------------------------------\n";
std::cout << "Recipient0: " << output0 << '\n'
<< "Recipient1: " << output1 << '\n'
<< "Recipient2: " << output2 << '\n';
return 0;
}
And if you want to use this mechanism with runtime values you can simply do the following:
int main() {
uint8_t input;
std::cout << "Please enter input value [0,2]\n";
std::cin >> input;
auto output = ColorInfo::updateColor(input);
std::cout << "Output: " << output << '\n';
return 0;
}
And this will work with runtime values.
