Question

I am looking for a good data-structure to store a simple key value mapping, but with
a special key construct in place.

A key is defined as section + group + keyword and this values represents some Ini like format:

[section]  
    (group)  
        keyword = value

Per definition it must be possible to find the wanted value by using
– section, group and keyword as key
– group and keyword as key
– keyword as key

I thought about using a QHash where I could add following keys to the hasmap:
– section|group|keyword
– group|keyword
– keyword

But this would mean that I use three key’s for the same value. Are there any better ways to do this in respect of wasted memory?

Thanks

Answer 1

QSettings already supports that but in different way. You can define any combination of / seperated texts to make Groups/SubGroups/Keys combination. But if it is “some ini kind format that already exists”, I’d suggest to write your own QSettings format and register it with QSettings::registerFormat. It should be quite easy task, and It is less work then writing whole class for reading/managing such format