For example, if I declare a long variable, can I assume it will always be aligned on a "sizeof(long)" boundary? Microsoft Visual C++ online help says so, but is it standard behavior? some more info: a. It is possible to explicitely create a misaligned integer (*bar): char foo[5] int * bar = (int *)(&foo[1]); b. Apparently, #...
Just to make it clear, I'm not interested in DOM scripting or writing Javascript in a browser. What I want to do is embed Javascript in a hobby game engine of mine. Now that we have the 5th generation of Javascript engines out (all blazing fast) I'm curious what engine would you choose to embed in a C++ framework (that includes actual ea...
I need a function that, given a path, tells me whether it is a Recycle Bin folder. I tried using functions like SHGetSpecialFolderPath with CSIDL_BITBUCKET, but that doesn't work because the Recycle Bin is a virtual folder that is the union of the Recycle Bins of all drives. This question is to document a response posted in http://blo...
C++ is all about memory ownership Aka "Ownership Semantics" It is the responsibility of the owner of a chunk of dynamically allocated memory to release that memory. So the question really becomes who owns the memory. In C++ ownership is documented by the type a RAW pointer is wrapped inside thus in a good (IMO) C++ program it is very r...
Is there a method for controlling the Balance of the Wave output that will work on both XP and Vista? ...
What is the best way (in C++) to set up a container allowing for double-indexing? Specifically, I have a list of objects, each indexed by a key (possibly multiple per key). This implies a multimap. The problem with this, however, is that it means a possibly worse-than-linear lookup to find the location of an object. I'd rather avoid dupl...
Compared to Simple memory access Disk access Memory access on another computer(on the same network) Disk access on another computer(on the same network) in C++ on windows. ...
While refactoring code and ridding myself of all those #defines that we're now taught to hate, I came across this beauty used to calculate the number of elements in a structure: #define STRUCTSIZE(s) (sizeof(s) / sizeof(*s)) Very useful as it is but can it be converted into an inline function or template? OK, ARRAYSIZE would be a bet...
When someone talks about a variables storage class specifier, what are they talking about? They also often talk about variable linkage in the same context, what is that? ...
Hello, using C++Builder 2007, the FindFirstFile and FindNextFile functions doesn't seem to be able to find some files on 64-bit versions of Vista and XP. My test application is 32-bit. If I use them to iterate through the folder C:\Windows\System32\Drivers they only find a handful of files although there are 185 when I issue a dir comm...
The C preprocessor is justifiably feared and shunned by the C++ community. In-lined functions, consts and templates are usually a safer and superior alternative to a #define. The following macro: #define SUCCEEDED(hr) ((HRESULT)(hr) >= 0) is in no way superior to the type safe: inline bool succeeded(int hr) { return hr >= 0; } Bu...
Referenced here and here...Why would I use two's complement over an epsilon method? It seems like the epsilon method would be good enough for most cases. Update: I'm purely looking for a theoretical reason why you'd use one over the other. I've always used the epsilon method. Has anyone used the 2's complement comparison successfu...
I'm fresh out of college and have been working in C++ for some time now. I understand all the basics of C++ and use them, but I'm having a hard time grasping more advanced topics like pointers and classes. I've read some books and tutorials and I understand the examples in them, but then when I look at some advanced real life examples ...
I'm experimenting with adding icons to a shell extension. I have this code (sanitized for easy reading), which works: InsertMenu(hmenu, index, MF_POPUP|MF_BYPOSITION, (UINT)hParentMenu, namestring); The next step is this code: HICON hIconLarge, hIconSmall; ICONINFO oIconInfo; ExtractIconEx("c:\\progra~1\\winzip\\winzip32.exe", 0, &hI...
Suppose I have the following code: class some_class{}; some_class some_function() { return some_class(); } This seems to work pretty well and saves me the trouble of having to declare a variable just to make a return value. But I don't think I've ever seen this in any kind of tutorial or reference. Is this a compiler-specific t...
I'm writing an inner loop that needs to place structs in contiguous storage. I don't know how many of these structs there will be ahead of time. My problem is that STL's vector initializes its values to 0, so no matter what I do, I incur the cost of the initialization plus the cost of setting the struct's members to their values. Is t...
Assuming a map where you want to preserve existing entries. 20% of the time, the entry you are inserting is new data. Is there an advantage to doing std::map::find then std::map::insert using that returned iterator? Or is it quicker to attempt the insert and then act based on whether or not the iterator indicates the record was or was ...
My first question on Stack Overflow... :-) Someone told me about a C++ style difference in their team. I have my own viewpoint on the subject, but I would be interested by pros and cons coming from everyone. So... In case you have a class property you want to expose via two getters, one read/write, and the other, readonly (i.e. there i...
I'm using gcc to generate a dependency file but my build rules put the output into a subdirectory. Is there a way to tell gcc to put my subdirectory prefix in the dependency file it generates for me? gcc $(INCLUDES) -E -MM $(CFLAGS) $(SRC) >>$(DEP) ...
If I am writing a library and I have a function that needs to return a sequence of values, I could do something like: std::vector<int> get_sequence(); However, this requires the library user to use the std::vector<> container rather than allowing them to use whatever container they want to use. In addition, it can add an extra copy o...