Thread Declaration in C++ - c++11

I was going through a project code in C. In there, I saw this declaration of thread :
pthread_t ui_thread = (pthread_t) 0;
I didn't understand the part starting from '=' operator. What is it and how can I code the same declaration in C++.

(pthread_t) 0 converts the literal integer value 0 to a thread handle pthread_t. This assumes that such a conversion is possible, and valid, and that this is a meaningful value (probably expected to be "no thread").
The full statement creates a variable ui_thread which is a thread handle of type pthread_t, and initializes it with this value.
In C++, you could probably write the same if you were on a platform where it was valid for C. However, you would be better to use the C++ thread library.
std::thread t;
will create a default-constructed thread handle with no associated thread, which is likely the equivalent to the above.

The (pthread_t) part is known as type casting in C. Also called explicit type conversion. It is just a way for the programmer to inform the compiler that the programmer means for the value (0 in this case) to be treated as the type pthread_t.
The code you have is still valid C++.
In C++11 you can probably just do this:
pthread_t ui_thread{nullptr};

Related

Does CLion possible evaluate a function when debugging Rust code?

A snip of Rust code:
pub fn main() {
let a = "hello";
let b = a.len();
let c =b;
println!("len:{}",c)
}
When debugging in CLion, Is it possible to evaluate a function? For example, debug the code step by step, now the code is running to the last line println!... and the current step stops here, by adding the expression a.len() to the watch a variable window, the IDE can't evaluate the a.len(). It says: error: no field named len
This is the same reason you can't make conditional breakpoints for Rust code:
Can't create a conditional breakpoint in VSCode-LLDB with Rust
I hope, I'm not too late to answer this, but with both lldb and gdb, Rust debugging capability is currently rather constrained.
Expressions that are straightforward work; anything complex is likely to produce issues.
My observations from rust-lldb trying this, are that only a small portion of Rust is understood by the expression parser.
There is no support for macros.
Non-used functions are not included in the final binary.
For instance, since that method is not included in the binary, you are unable to execute capacity() on the HashMap in the debugger.
Methods must be named as follows:
struct value.method(&struct value)
There is no technique that I've discovered to call monomorphized functions on generic structs (like HashMap).
For example, "hello" is a const char [5] including the trailing NUL byte. String constants "..." in lldb expressions are produced as C-style string constants.
Therefore, they are not valid functions

memcpy from one type to another type. How do we access the destination afterwards?

uint32_t u32 = 0;
uint16_t u16[2];
static_assert(sizeof(u32) == sizeof(u16), "");
memcpy(u16, &u32, sizeof(u32)); // defined?
// if defined, how to we access the data from here on?
Is this defined behaviour? And, if so, what type of pointer may we use to access the target data after the memcpy?
Must we use uint16_t*, because that suitable for the declared type of u16?
Or must we use uint32_t*, because the type of the source data (the source data copied from by memcpy) is uint_32?
(Personally interested in C++11/C++14. But a discussion of related languages like C would be interesting also.)
Is this defined behavio[u]r?
Yes. memcpying into a pod is well-defined and you ensured that the sizing is the correct.
Must we use uint16_t*, because that suitable for the declared type of u16?
Yes, of course. u16 is an array of two uint16_ts so it must be accessed as such. Accessing it via a uint32_t* would be undefined behavior by the strict-aliasing rule.
It doesn't matter what the source type was. What matters is that you have an object of type uint16_t[2].
On the other hand, this:
uint32_t p;
new (&p) uint16_t(42);
std::cout << p;
is undefined behavior, because now there is an object of a different type whose lifetime has begin at &p and we're accessing it through the wrong type.
The C++ standard delegates to C standard:
The contents and meaning of the header <cstring> are the same as the C standard library header <string.h>.
The C standard specifies:
7.24.1/3 For all functions in this subclause, each character shall be interpreted as if it had the type unsigned char (and therefore every possible object representation is valid and has a different value).
So, to answer your question: Yes, the behaviour is defined.
Yes, uint16_t* is appropriate because uint16_t is the type of the object.
No, the type of the source doesn't matter.
C++ standard doesn't specify such thing as object without declared type or how it would behave. I interpret that to mean that the effective type is implementation defined for objects with no declared type.
Even in C, the source doesn't matter in this case. A more complete version of quote from C standard (draft, N1570) that you are concerned about, emphasis mine:
6.5/6 [...] If a value is copied into an object having no declared type using memcpy or memmove, or is copied as an array of character type, then the effective type of the modified object for that access and for subsequent accesses that do not modify the value is the effective type of the object from which the value is copied, if it has one. [...]
This rule doesn't apply, because objects in u16 do have a declared type

__verify_pcpu_ptr function in Linux Kernel - What does it do?

#define __verify_pcpu_ptr(ptr)
do {
const void __percpu *__vpp_verify = (typeof((ptr) + 0))NULL;
(void)__vpp_verify;
} while (0)
#define VERIFY_PERCPU_PTR(__p)
({
__verify_pcpu_ptr(__p);
(typeof(*(__p)) __kernel __force *)(__p);
})
What do these two functions do? What are they used for? How do they work?
Thanks.
This is part of the scheme used by per_cpu_ptr to support a pointer that gets a different value for each CPU. There are two motives here:
Ensure that accesses to the per-cpu data structure are only made via the per_cpu_ptr macro.
Ensure that the argument given to the macro is of the correct type.
Restating, this ensures that (a) you don't accidentally access a per-cpu pointer without the macro (which would only reference the first of N members), and (b) that you don't inadvertently use the macro to cast a pointer that is not of the correct declared type to one that is.
By using these macros, you get the support of the compiler in type-checking without any runtime overhead. The compiler is smart enough to eventually recognize that all of these complex machinations result in no observable state change, yet the type-checking will have been performed. So you get the benefit of the type-checking, but no actual executable code will have been emitted by the compiler.

Avoiding self assignment in std::shuffle

I stumbled upon the following problem when using the checked implementation of glibcxx:
/usr/include/c++/4.8.2/debug/vector:159:error: attempt to self move assign.
Objects involved in the operation:
sequence "this" # 0x0x1b3f088 {
type = NSt7__debug6vectorIiSaIiEEE;
}
Which I have reduced to this minimal example:
#include <vector>
#include <random>
#include <algorithm>
struct Type {
std::vector<int> ints;
};
int main() {
std::vector<Type> intVectors = {{{1}}, {{1, 2}}};
std::shuffle(intVectors.begin(), intVectors.end(), std::mt19937());
}
Tracing the problem I found that shuffle wants to std::swap an element with itself. As the Type is user defined and no specialization for std::swap has been given for it, the default one is used which creates a temporary and uses operator=(&&) to transfer the values:
_Tp __tmp = _GLIBCXX_MOVE(__a);
__a = _GLIBCXX_MOVE(__b);
__b = _GLIBCXX_MOVE(__tmp);
As Type does not explicitly give operator=(&&) it is default implemented by "recursively" applying the same operation on its members.
The problem occurs on line 2 of the swap code where __a and __b point to the same object which results in effect in the code __a.operator=(std::move(__a)) which then triggers the error in the checked implementation of vector::operator=(&&).
My question is: Who's fault is this?
Is it mine, because I should provide an implementation for swap that makes "self swap" a NOP?
Is it std::shuffle's, because it should not try to swap an element with itself?
Is it the checked implementation's, because self-move-assigment is perfectly fine?
Everything is correct, the checked implementation is just doing me a favor in doing this extra check (but then how to turn it off)?
I have read about shuffle requiring the iterators to be ValueSwappable. Does this extend to self-swap (which is a mere runtime problem and can not be enforced by compile-time concept checks)?
Addendum
To trigger the error more directly one could use:
#include <vector>
int main() {
std::vector<int> vectorOfInts;
vectorOfInts = std::move(vectorOfInts);
}
Of course this is quite obvious (why would you move a vector to itself?).
If you where swapping std::vectors directly the error would not occur because of the vector class having a custom implementation of the swap function that does not use operator=(&&).
The libstdc++ Debug Mode assertion is based on this rule in the standard, from [res.on.arguments]
If a function argument binds to an rvalue reference parameter, the implementation may assume that this parameter is a unique reference to this argument.
i.e. the implementation can assume that the object bound to the parameter of T::operator=(T&&) does not alias *this, and if the program violates that assumption the behaviour is undefined. So if the Debug Mode detects that in fact the rvalue reference is bound to *this it has detected undefined behaviour and so can abort.
The paragraph contains this note as well (emphasis mine):
[Note: If a program casts an lvalue to an xvalue while passing that lvalue to a library function (e.g., by calling the function with the argument
std::move(x)), the program is effectively asking that function to treat that lvalue as a temporary object. The implementation is free to optimize away aliasing checks which might be needed if the
argument was an lvalue. —end note]
i.e. if you say x = std::move(x) then the implementation can optimize away any check for aliasing such as:
X::operator=(X&& rval) { if (&rval != this) ...
Since the implementation can optimize that check away, the standard library types don't even bother doing such a check in the first place. They just assume self-move-assignment is undefined.
However, because self-move-assignment can arise in quite innocent code (possibly even outside the user's control, because the std::lib performs a self-swap) the standard was changed by Defect Report 2468. I don't think the resolution of that DR actually helps though. It doesn't change anything in [res.on.arguments], which means it is still undefined behaviour to perform a self-move-assignment, at least until issue 2839 gets resolved. It is clear that the C++ standard committee think self-move-assignment should not result in undefined behaviour (even if they've failed to actually say that in the standard so far) and so it's a libstdc++ bug that our Debug Mode still contains assertions to prevent self-move-assignment.
Until we remove the overeager checks from libstdc++ you can disable that individual assertion (but still keep all the other Debug Mode checks) by doing this before including any other headers:
#include <debug/macros.h>
#undef __glibcxx_check_self_move_assign
#define __glibcxx_check_self_move_assign(x)
Or equivalently, using just command-line flags (so no need to change the source code):
-D_GLIBCXX_DEBUG -include debug/macros.h -U__glibcxx_check_self_move_assign '-D__glibcxx_check_self_move_assign(x)='
This tells the compiler to include <debug/macros.h> at the start of the file, then undefines the macro that performs the self-move-assign assertion, and then redefines it to be empty.
(In general defining, undefining or redefining libstdc++'s internal macros is undefined and unsupported, but this will work, and has my blessing).
It is a bug in GCC's checked implementation. According to the C++11 standard, swappable requirements include (emphasis mine):
17.6.3.2 §4 An rvalue or lvalue t is swappable if and only if t is swappable with any rvalue or lvalue, respectively, of type T
Any rvalue or lvalue includes, by definition, t itself, therefore to be swappable swap(t,t) must be legal. At the same time the default swap implementation requires the following
20.2.2 §2 Requires: Type T shall be MoveConstructible (Table 20) and MoveAssignable (Table 22).
Therefore, to be swappable under the definition of the default swap operator self-move assignment must be valid and have the postcondition that after self assignment t is equivalent to it's old value (not necessarily a no-op though!) as per Table 22.
Although the object you are swapping is not a standard type, MoveAssignable has no precondition that rv and t refer to different objects, and as long as all members are MoveAssignable (as std::vector should be) the generate move assignment operator must be correct (as it performs memberwise move assignment as per 12.8 §29). Furthermore, although the note states that rv has valid but unspecified state, any state except being equivalent to it's original value would be incorrect for self assignment, as otherwise the postcondition would be violated.
I read a couple of tutorials about copy constructors and move assignments and stuff (for example this). They all say that the object must check for self assignment and do nothing in that case. So I would say it is the checked implementation's fault, because self-move-assigment is perfectly fine.

Understanding MAKEINTRESOURCEW definition

Looking at the Windows SDK, I found this #define directive for MAKEINTRESOURCEW:
#define MAKEINTRESOURCEW(i) ((LPWSTR)((ULONG_PTR)((WORD)(i))))
Can someone explain to me what the heck that means? For example, what would be the value of MAKEINTRESOURCEW(0)? (1)? (-1)?
The result of this macro will be pointer to long string with value equal to given parameter. You can see it by reading precompiler output (see /P C++ compiler options). All casting is required to compile this macro result, when LP[w]WSTR pointer is required, both in Win32 and x64 configurations.
Some Windows API, like LoadIcon, expect string pointer as their parameter. Possibly, these functions test the pointer value, and if it is less than some maximum, they interpret it as resource index, and not as string (problems of ugly C-style interface). So, this macro allows to pass WORD as string, without changing its value, with appropriate casting.
For the most part, it leaves the value unchanged, but converts it from an int to a pointer so it's acceptable to functions that expect to see a pointer. The intermediate casts widen the input int to the same size as a pointer, while ensuring against it's being sign extended. In case you care, ULONG_PTR is not a "ULONG POINTER" like you might guess -- rather, it's an unsigned long the same size as a pointer. Back before 64-bit programming became a concern, the definition was something like:
#define MAKEINTRESOURCE(i) (LPTSTR) ((DWORD) ((WORD) (i)))
Nowadays, they use ULONG_PTR, which is a 32-bit unsigned long for a 32-bit target, and a 64-bit unsigned long for a 64-bit target.
That's a macro that casts an argument i to a word, then casts that result to a pointer to an unsigned long, then again to a long pointer to a wide-character string.
Like other users said - it just casts an integer into a "pointer to a string".
The reason for this is the following: At the ancient times of Windows 3.0 people tried to be minimalistic as much as possible.
It was assumed that resources in the executable can have either string identifier or integer. Hence when you try to access such a resource - you specify one of the above, and the function distinguish what you meant automatically (by checking if the provided "pointer" looks like a valid pointer).
Since the function could not receive a "variable argument type" - they decided to make it receive LPCTSTR (or similar), whereas the actual parameter passed may be integer.
Another example from Windows API: A pointer to the window procedure. Every window has a window procedure (accessed via GetWindowLong with GWL_WNDPROC flag.
However sometimes it's just an integer which specifies what "kind" of a window is that.
Then there's a CallWindowProc which knows to distinguish those cases.

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