I am trying to write a validation method for a template input, which tests if the input is a std::string
, std::vector
, or an std::array
.
However for the latter I am having an issue as I must provide a constant length for the
type definition.
So when I call std::is_same<T, std::array<uint8_t, container.size()>>::value
the compiler of cause gets angry (makes sense container.size() is not static). Is there are way to get around this?
I don't know the size of the container in advance and I will never know it :(
template<typename T> bool valid_container_type(const T& container)
{
(void) container;
if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::vector<uint8_t>>::value)
{
return true;
}
else if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::vector<char>>::value)
{
return true;
}
else if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::array<char, container.size()>>::value)
{
return true;
}
else if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::array<uint8_t, container.size()>>::value)
{
return true;
}
else if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::string>::value)
{
return true;
}
return false;
}
The problem is that container.size()
is not a constant expression and can't be used as non-type template argument.
You can add a type trait to get the size at compile-time (or use std::tuple_size
directly as @康桓瑋 commented). E.g.
template <typename>
struct get_array_size;
template <typename T, size_t S>
struct get_array_size<std::array<T, S>> {
constexpr static size_t size = S;
};
Then use it as:
if constexpr (std::is_same<T, std::array<uint8_t, get_array_size<T>::size>>::value)
Note that you have to move the if
branch for std::string
before the one before std::array
. Otherwise you need to define size
(and give it a default value) in the primary template too.