Hi folks,
I've observed in many C applications, often compile-time defined
data like strings are copied unnecessarily.
For example, if you pass names to certain objects (eg. opening a
file, creating a window, etc) that will never change of disappear
during the process' lifetime (eg. compiled-in), those strings
dont need to be copied.
Now the big question becomes: how to decide this ?
I'm currently experimenting with a new string reference datatype
that has an extra bit which tells whether the string is static.
Essentially a struct consisting of the char* pointer and an
extra byte for the flag. That struct then will be used instead
of the const char* pointers. A few inline functions handle the
conversion from/to normal const char* and on-demand copying.
Just some theoretical example:
Some function
FOO* create_foo(const char* name)
now becomes
FOO* create_foo(GCStr name)
and the call now would be
create_foo(G_CSTR_STATIC("hello world"));
in case we dont have an "static" string, but something with
limited lifetime, it could look like this:
create_foo(G_CSTR_DYNAMIC(bar));
Inside create_foo() we'll then replace g_strdup() by some
G_CSTR_COPY() and g_free() by G_CSTR_FREE(). These functions
will know whether the string has to be copied/free'd.
Let's just leave the question of API-compatibility aside,
what do you think about this idea ?
greets
--
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Enrico Weigelt, metux IT service -- http://www.metux.de/
phone: +49 36207 519931 email: weig...@metux.de
mobile: +49 151 27565287 icq: 210169427 skype: nekrad666
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Embedded-Linux / Portierung / Opensource-QM / Verteilte Systeme
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