Difference between revisions of "cpp/utility/functional/reference wrapper"

Revision as of 13:52, 16 November 2018

std::reference_wrapper is a class template that wraps a reference in a copyable, assignable object. It is frequently used as a mechanism to store references inside standard containers (like std::vector) which cannot normally hold references.

Specifically, std::reference_wrapper is a CopyConstructible and CopyAssignable wrapper around a reference to object or reference to function of type T. Instances of std::reference_wrapper are objects (they can be copied or stored in containers) but they are implicitly convertible to T&, so that they can be used as arguments with the functions that take the underlying type by reference.

If the stored reference is Callable, std::reference_wrapper is callable with the same arguments.

Helper functions std::ref and std::cref are often used to generate std::reference_wrapper objects.

std::reference_wrapper is also used to pass objects by reference to std::bind, the constructor of std::thread, or the helper functions std::make_pair and std::make_tuple.

Member types

Member functions

Deduction guides(since C++17)

Possible implementation

template <class T>
class reference_wrapper {
public:
  // types
  typedef T type;
 
  // construct/copy/destroy
  reference_wrapper(T& ref) noexcept : _ptr(std::addressof(ref)) {}
  reference_wrapper(T&&) = delete;
  reference_wrapper(const reference_wrapper&) noexcept = default;
 
  // assignment
  reference_wrapper& operator=(const reference_wrapper& x) noexcept = default;
 
  // access
  operator T& () const noexcept { return *_ptr; }
  T& get() const noexcept { return *_ptr; }
 
  template< class... ArgTypes >
  std::invoke_result_t<T&, ArgTypes...>
    operator() ( ArgTypes&&... args ) const {
    return std::invoke(get(), std::forward<ArgTypes>(args)...);
  }
 
private:
  T* _ptr;
};
 
// deduction guides
template<class T>
reference_wrapper(reference_wrapper<T>) -> reference_wrapper<T>;

Example

#include <algorithm>
#include <list>
#include <vector>
#include <iostream>
#include <numeric>
#include <random>
#include <functional>
 
int main()
{
    std::list<int> l(10);
 
    std::iota(l.begin(), l.end(), -4);
    std::vector<std::reference_wrapper<int>> v(l.begin(), l.end());
 
    // can't use shuffle on a list (requires random access), but can use it on a vector
    std::shuffle(v.begin(), v.end(), std::mt19937{std::random_device{}()});
 
    std::cout << "Contents of the list: ";
    for (int n : l){ 
        std::cout << n << ' ';
    }
 
    std::cout << "\nContents of the list, as seen through a shuffled vector: ";
    for (int i : v){
        std::cout << i << ' ';
    }
 
    std::cout << "\n\nDoubling the values in the initial list...\n\n";
    for (int& i : l) {
        i *= 2;
    }
 
    std::cout << "Contents of the list, as seen through a shuffled vector: ";
    for (int i : v){
       std::cout << i << ' ';
    }
}

Contents of the list: -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 
Contents of the list, as seen through a shuffled vector: -1 2 -2 1 5 0 3 -3 -4 4 
Doubling the values in the initial list...
Contents of the list, as seen through a shuffled vector: -2 4 -4 2 10 0 6 -6 -8 8

See also