Thread: Reinventing the Wheel

Originally Posted by samGwilliam

I didn't read a single line of that (and I'm not going to), but it's entertaining to see just how much I've gotten under your skin!!

your loss, bro. You haven't "gotten under my skin", I was trying to help you. It's highly unlikely I'll ever have to deal with your code, so feel free to immerse yourself in all the misery of tracking down memory leaks and stack corruptions.

I'd just use a bog-standard array, obviously.

hmm... I am starting to suspect that you think that vectors are not standard. Although we often speak of the STL as if it were like the ATL, the truth is that the "Standard Template Library" really is standard, since it is incorporated into the C++ standard library. In fact, I understand that C++ strings were not from the STL to begin with. Therefore, you could just use a "bog-standard" std::string.

But if a flexible, dynamic method of storage was really that important then I'd use a linked list.

What of it?

What if you need random access? What if you want a container of key/value pairs with faster than linear time search? I think that it is better to be flexible in your choice of container, hence choosing one that best fits your solution. An array (including vectors) is often a reasonable "default" choice.

I didn't read a single line of that (and I'm not going to), but it's entertaining to see just how much I've gotten under your skin!!

You can stop trolling now. If you have made up your mind and refuse to listen to reason, then say so. It is not necessary to scorn the effort taken by someone else to explain things to you. If you continue with such an attitude, then you can expect no help from the users of this message board.

I just don't like relying too much on other people's code.

LOL... Be real - and stop joking...

You do not mean - that in your everyday work you only use your own hand made OS with hand-made compiler? To be sure that your exe relies only on your own hand-made code?

Please, please - leave your fantasies and come back to the real world.

The attitude of the fella isn't new. You see that everywhere and not just in C or C++ circles. Some people "say" (and say is the operative word) they don't use external libraries, standard libraries, other people's code, etc...

It is always quiet entertaining to see these people complete lack of judgment and good reasoning. It is particularly entertaining to imagine these people having to face certain coding challenges like... oh... I don't know... having to handle complex mathematical operations without a math library, or coding their own lossless compression algorithm, or a regular expression parser... all just because they don't use other people's code.

As you say, vart. It's a joke.

Originally Posted by samGwilliam

I didn't read a single line of that (and I'm not going to), but it's entertaining to see just how much I've gotten under your skin!!

This post is amazing.

I don't like using libraries myself. I've always been fine using standard libraries, but I just didn't like learning the ins and outs of 3rd party libraries that always seemed much larger and more complex than what I was aiming at accomplishing.

As time has gone on and I've been working on different projects, I've come to better appreciate libraries written for multiple platforms that tackle a good portion of what I want to do. Perhaps one reason is that I'm working on more and more larger projects than I have been in the past, although that's not saying much since I haven't really done much.

If you can't take the opportunity to read other people's posts, or to realize the benefit of using other tried and tested code, then as ChaosEngine said, it is your loss. I'm not sure why you would take pleasure in throwing someone's explanation back in their face when, by all appearances that I can see, their intent was to help you.

Originally Posted by samGwilliam

Not of chars. Clearly I wasn't reading the posts properly. I'd just use a bog-standard array, obviously.

But if a flexible, dynamic method of storage was really that important then I'd use a linked list.

What of it?

If you need a concrete example, I work on a C++ program that was originally written circa 1995, and it's full of C strings.

This week I converted a few text-intensive functions from character arrays to C++ strings. Removing all of the C string manipulation crap and over allocated buffers trimmed around 500 lines from the program, and has reclaimed several thousand bytes of stack space.

I used to scorn C++ strings and containers too, but experiences like this were a hell of a wake-up call.

You are right Citizen. To each his own (sp?)

Going back on topic...

Only now, after one year of first starting dabbling in C++, did I start to become interested on the inner workings of the STL. Not so much because I felt a need to understand it, but because of curiosity.

Naturally, because my knowledge of C++ is still so limited, I'm only scratching the surface of what really means "understanding the inner workings of the STL". Nevertheless, the STL is proving to be an excellent learning tool in its own right and "reinventing the wheel" has been on my case a pure learning exercise. In fact, I dislike the term when applied here.

I don't honestly think using arrays is reinventing the wheel. I would rather prefer to think in creating new laws that govern how the wheel turns. Because that's the only use I can think for them when we see what the STL already offers.

What I'm feeling while I'm pretending to be a C++ programmer developing my own game is that arrays are far more common that what one is lead to believe by the literature warnings and advises on that matter. And this goes for other elements of the STL too like std::string. I feel the need to create new laws is very common.

However, my knowledge is flawed by both the fact I still smell like milk when it comes to programming in C++ and because I'm led by several book authors to develop a non-healthy attitude towards not believing in their advise.

When I'm told not to use exceptions when I can avoid it because of the tradeoff in speed and code size and leaves it at that, I have to ask "But what then when speed and size is not a problem, which is the case in most of the applications developed around the world?" The same applies to the STL in the sense that examples like the ones provided by Chaos are much more enlightening than simply advocating "don't do it because of [insert reasons here]" without also debating "When should you do what I'm telling you not to do"

These reasons, my friends are obvious to you. You know your C++ well. But we don't. We still smell like milk. And being youngsters on the matter whe are particularly prone to a) make mistakes in the choices we do, b) only listen to bad advise and c) be religious about our believes.