Re: Help with pointer to data member template argument.

From:
"Greg Herlihy" <greghe@pacbell.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++.moderated
Date:
30 Jul 2006 16:34:45 -0400
Message-ID:
<1154291299.147916.234450@s13g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>
Corey O'Connor wrote:

Hello,

I'm trying to figure out how to make a template that will fail to
instantiate if given a pointer to data member argument with a non-const
type. For example, I'm looking for a template that would fail to
instantiate for &A::x but not &B::x with A and B defined like so:

struct A
{
     int x;
     A(int in_x) : x(in_x) {}
};

struct B
{
     const int x;
     B(int in_x) : x(in_x) {}
};

I'd prefer the template to be generic to all types in a pointer to
member non-type argument. I've succeeded in getting something like I'd
want with:

template<typename T, typename V> no_type is_const_data_member_tester(V
T::*);

template<typename T, typename V> yes_type
is_const_data_member_tester(const V T::*);

but I haven't been able to work these into a template class such that
the template would fail to instantiate in the case that
is_const_data_member_tester would return no_type.


The template could be declared with a private constructor. A friend
function accepting a const member pointer parameter could instantiate
the class template, while a non-friend function accepting a non-const
member pointer could not - and the program would fail to compile in
that event:

    template <class T, class M>
    class DataMember
    {
    public:
        // declare a friend factory function
        template <class T1, class M1>
        friend
        DataMember<T1, M1>
        GetDataMemberTemplate(const M1 T1::*mt);

    private:
        DataMember() {}
    };

    // factory function definition - requires const member pointer
    template <class T, class M>
    DataMember<T, M> GetDataMemberTemplate(const M T::*mt)
    {
        return DataMember<T, M>();
    }

    // non-const alternative causes compile-time error
    template <class T, class M>
    DataMember<T, M> GetDataMemberTemplate(M T::*mt)
    {
        return DataMember<T, M>(); // error - constructor private
    }

    struct A
    {
        int x;
        A(int in_x) : x(in_x) {}
    };

    struct B
    {
        const int x;
        B(int in_x) : x(in_x) {}
    };

    int main()
    {
        GetDataMemberTemplate(&A::x); // Error
        GetDataMemberTemplate(&B::x);; // OK
    }

Greg

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