Re: maps, iterators, and const

From:
"Alf P. Steinbach" <alfps@start.no>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++
Date:
Fri, 21 May 2010 18:46:05 +0200
Message-ID:
<ht6d8r$bsv$1@news.eternal-september.org>
* John, on 21.05.2010 17:54:

Solve this by creating your own iterators which inherit privately from
the map's iterators and don't expose the map's iterators in your
custom interface.

/Leigh


Hmm. This would be more complicated than I would like since I don't want
to have to define additional classes. It's not ideal, but maybe I will
just go the const_cast route and define my map as std::map<int,const A*>
and use const_cast internally in the few places I need to alter an A.


Possibly you have design level problem, but possibly you have not.

You might consider something like the following:

<code>
#include <map>
#include <iostream>

class A {};

class B
{
     typedef std::map< int, A* > Map;
     Map map_;

     B( B const& other );
     B& operator=( B const& other );

public:
     B()
     {
         map_[1] = new A;
         map_[2] = new A;
         map_[3] = new A;
     }

     class ConstIter
     {
     friend class B;
     private:
         typedef std::pair< int, A const* > ConstPair;
         Map::const_iterator current_;

         ConstIter( Map::const_iterator start )
             : current_( start )
         {}

         ConstPair const* operator->() const; // No such.

     public:
         ConstIter& operator++()
         {
             ++current_; return *this;
         }

         ConstIter operator++( int )
         {
             return ConstIter( current_++ );
         }

         ConstPair const operator*() const
         {
             return *current_;
         }

         bool operator==( ConstIter const& other )
         {
             return current_ == other.current_;
         }

         bool operator!=( ConstIter const& other )
         {
             return current_ != other.current_;
         }

         int key() const { return current_->first; }
         A const* value() const { return current_->second; }
     };

     ConstIter begin() const { return map_.begin(); }
     ConstIter end() const { return map_.end(); }
};

int main ()
{
     B b;
     for( B::ConstIter it = b.begin(); it != b.end(); ++it )
     {
         std::cout << it.key() << std::endl;
     }
}
</code>

Cheers & hth.,

- Alf

--
blog at <url: http://alfps.wordpress.com>

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