/* Dynamic testing for abstract is-a relationships. Copyright (C) 2012-2014 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Contributed by Lawrence Crowl. This file is part of GCC. GCC is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 3, or (at your option) any later version. GCC is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with GCC; see the file COPYING3. If not see . */ /* This header generic type query and conversion functions. USING THE GENERIC TYPE FACILITY The user functions are: bool is_a (pointer) Tests whether the pointer actually points to a more derived TYPE. Suppose you have a symtab_node *ptr, AKA symtab_node *ptr. You can test whether it points to a 'derived' cgraph_node as follows. if (is_a (ptr)) .... TYPE *as_a (pointer) Converts pointer to a TYPE*. You can just assume that it is such a node. do_something_with (as_a *ptr); TYPE *dyn_cast (pointer) Converts pointer to TYPE* if and only if "is_a pointer". Otherwise, returns NULL. This function is essentially a checked down cast. This functions reduce compile time and increase type safety when treating a generic item as a more specific item. You can test and obtain a pointer to the 'derived' type in one indivisible operation. if (cgraph_node *cptr = dyn_cast (ptr)) .... As an example, the code change is from if (symtab_function_p (node)) { struct cgraph_node *cnode = cgraph (node); .... } to if (cgraph_node *cnode = dyn_cast (node)) { .... } The necessary conditional test defines a variable that holds a known good pointer to the specific item and avoids subsequent conversion calls and the assertion checks that may come with them. When, the property test is embedded within a larger condition, the variable declaration gets pulled out of the condition. (This approach leaves some room for using the variable inappropriately.) if (symtab_variable_p (node) && varpool (node)->finalized) varpool_analyze_node (varpool (node)); becomes varpool_node *vnode = dyn_cast (node); if (vnode && vnode->finalized) varpool_analyze_node (vnode); Note that we have converted two sets of assertions in the calls to varpool into safe and efficient use of a variable. If you use these functions and get a 'inline function not defined' or a 'missing symbol' error message for 'is_a_helper<....>::test', it means that the connection between the types has not been made. See below. EXTENDING THE GENERIC TYPE FACILITY Each connection between types must be made by defining a specialization of the template member function 'test' of the template class 'is_a_helper'. For example, template <> template <> inline bool is_a_helper ::test (symtab_node *p) { return p->type == SYMTAB_FUNCTION; } If a simple reinterpret_cast between the pointer types is incorrect, then you must also specialize the template member function 'cast'. Failure to do so when needed may result in a crash. For example, template <> template <> inline bool is_a_helper ::cast (symtab_node *p) { return &p->x_function; } */ #ifndef GCC_IS_A_H #define GCC_IS_A_H /* A generic type conversion internal helper class. */ template struct is_a_helper { template static inline bool test (U *p); template static inline T *cast (U *p); }; /* Note that we deliberately do not define the 'test' member template. Not doing so will result in a build-time error for type relationships that have not been defined, rather than a run-time error. See the discussion above for when to define this member. */ /* This is the generic implementation for casting from one type to another. Do not use this routine directly; it is an internal function. See the discussion above for when to define this member. */ template template inline T * is_a_helper ::cast (U *p) { return reinterpret_cast (p); } /* The public interface. */ /* A generic test for a type relationship. See the discussion above for when to use this function. The question answered is "Is type T a derived type of type U?". */ template inline bool is_a (U *p) { return is_a_helper::test (p); } /* A generic conversion from a base type U to a derived type T. See the discussion above for when to use this function. */ template inline T * as_a (U *p) { gcc_checking_assert (is_a (p)); return is_a_helper ::cast (p); } /* A generic checked conversion from a base type U to a derived type T. See the discussion above for when to use this function. */ template inline T * dyn_cast (U *p) { if (is_a (p)) return is_a_helper ::cast (p); else return static_cast (0); } #endif /* GCC_IS_A_H */