C++/CLI equivalent to STL vector and deque?

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Ian

I would like to port my class library written in standard C++ with STL to
C++/CLI. Several of my classes inherit from std::vector or std::deque.
From what I can see, dot.net does not offer equivalent classes. Is this
really the case or have I missed an entire section of the dot.net
documentation? One could argue ArrayList offers a poor substitute to
std::vector.

I understand an effort was made to port STL to C++/CLI and this would
represent a significant addition to C++/CLI. What is the current status of
STL in C++/CLI?


Thanks,

Ian
 
Ian said:
I would like to port my class library written in standard C++ with STL to
C++/CLI. Several of my classes inherit from std::vector or std::deque.
From what I can see, dot.net does not offer equivalent classes. Is this
really the case or have I missed an entire section of the dot.net
documentation? One could argue ArrayList offers a poor substitute to
std::vector.
Click to expand...

With .NET 2.0, you've got generics collections :
System::Collections::Generics::List<T> is quite close to std::vector.

On the other hand, there is no real equivalent to deque. The .NET
Collection namespaces are still quite poor when compared to the STL
(they certainly miss the flexibility offered by the container /
algorithm separation of the STL).
Still, some progress has been made in the last version. For example,
complexity for various operations is at least specified for the
generics collections....
I understand an effort was made to port STL to C++/CLI and this would
represent a significant addition to C++/CLI. What is the current status of
STL in C++/CLI?
Click to expand...

There is a beta version of the so-called "STL.NET" in the last
Community Technical Preview of Orcas.... I don't know wether we will
see a release version of it before Orcas is released...

Arnaud
MVP - VC
 
Ian said:
I would like to port my class library written in standard C++ with STL to
C++/CLI. Several of my classes inherit from std::vector or std::deque.
From what I can see, dot.net does not offer equivalent classes. Is this
really the case or have I missed an entire section of the dot.net
documentation? One could argue ArrayList offers a poor substitute to
std::vector.
Click to expand...

..NET collections are indeed a joke compared to STL, but there are some
3rd party libraries that look much better. For instance, look for Power
Collections.
 
Ian said:
I would like to port my class library written in standard C++ with STL to
C++/CLI. Several of my classes inherit from std::vector or std::deque.
From what I can see, dot.net does not offer equivalent classes. Is this
really the case or have I missed an entire section of the dot.net
documentation? One could argue ArrayList offers a poor substitute to
std::vector.
Click to expand...

..NET collections are indeed a joke compared to STL, but there are some
3rd party libraries that look much better. For instance, look for Power
Collections.
 
Nemanja said:
.NET collections are indeed a joke compared to STL, but there are some
3rd party libraries that look much better. For instance, look for
Power Collections.
Click to expand...

also check out the C5 collections library (google for it - you'll find it).

-cd
 
Nemanja Trifunovic said:
.NET collections are indeed a joke compared to STL, but there are some
3rd party libraries that look much better. For instance, look for Power
Collections.
Click to expand...

Hello Nemanja,

Thanks for the recommendation. The question is, how long can we expect
these libraries to be supported? I have already invested a considerable
amount of time in STL with the expectation that MS would continue to support
it. It seems I was wrong. If I make the switch to Power Collections, given
that there is no one group that stands to make money off of it, in your
opinion, is this something that you expect will be around for some time to
come?

Thanks again,

Ian
 


Hello Carl,

My question is the same as that posted for Nemanja. These collections look
interesting but the question is, in your opinion, how long will they be
supported?

Ian
 
Ian said:
Hello Nemanja,

Thanks for the recommendation. The question is, how long can we expect
these libraries to be supported? I have already invested a considerable
amount of time in STL with the expectation that MS would continue to support
it. It seems I was wrong. If I make the switch to Power Collections, given
that there is no one group that stands to make money off of it, in your
opinion, is this something that you expect will be around for some time to
come?

Thanks again,

Ian
Click to expand...

Ian:

STL is still, and always will be, supported for unmmanaged types. And I
am sure that if MS ever gets stl.net working for managed types they will
continue to support that also.

I too would hesitate to commit myself to a 3rd party collection library,
but then I am hesitating to move to .net also!

David Wilkinson
 
Ian said:
Hello Carl,

My question is the same as that posted for Nemanja. These collections
look interesting but the question is, in your opinion, how long will they
be supported?
Click to expand...

Assuming that STL.NET makes it into Orcas (the next version of Visual
Studio - and I fiully expect that it will make it in), then it'll be
supported by MSFT for years and years and years.

As for PowerCollections and C5, they're not officially supported by anyone,
but I suspect that both will have a viable user community that will
promulgate fixes as bugs are found. These are both open source projects, so
you can always choose to support them yourself, assuming you have the
resources. I'm not sure about C5, but I know that PowerCollections comes
with an extensive unit test suite (something like 700 tests) and appears to
be of good quality. You can find more extensive documentation for
PowerCollections in Tod Golding's book "Professional .NET 2.0 Generics" from
Wrox.

That said, I haven't adopted either of those libraries for my own work -
holding out instead for STL.NET and writing/adapting what I need in the
meantime.

-cd
 
David said:
I too would hesitate to commit myself to a 3rd party collection library,
but then I am hesitating to move to .net also!
Click to expand...

I would probably be more concerned about WinForms itself. No question
that it will be supported for a while, but after .NET 3.0 and Orcas, it
will be an old, unwanted API, which will only be maintained to support
backwards compatibility. WPF will replace it, and at one moment it will
be highly desirable to migrate GUI to that API. The moment will come
when the GUI that we develop today will be an unwanted baggage. I don't
know, but I feel quite hesitant about starting to design large WinForms
applications, unless I wrap every form very carefully, to detach them
from the actual framework as far as possible. I have to create my own
controls, and I have the feeling I'll soon have to redo that work as
well. I don't worry about particular products, but the reusable
portions. I do have portions that I've been reusing in every project for
the past few years. At one moment it would be nice to settle down with a
..NET windowing API that we can call permanent and we can build around
over the years. I feel so uncertain when programming in WinForms, as I
have no idea how much of that code will be reusable directly in WPF, and
it gives me a sour feeling. I don't worry too much yet, as 99.9% of the
code I use today is unmanaged.

Tom
 
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