Question

I currently have to optimize code from another programmer. He left me with a lot of template classes and I would like to make use of functions from Intels IPP-Library to speed up computation. The problem is, that most of the time these functions require that you know what datatypes you are using. So I would like to rewrite the template so that in case the operation can be optimized it will use the specialized code. In case it can’t it should fall back to the original code.

The problem is that I would need to check if a certain datatype is being used and I don’t know how to do that.

An example. I would like to do something like this:

 template < class Elem > class Array1D
 {
    Array1D<Elem>& operator += (const Elem& a)
    {
    if (typeof(Elem) == uchar)
    {
       // use special IPP operation here
    }
    else
    {
           // fall back to default behaviour
    }
 }

Any ideas on how to do this? Preferrably without the help of other libraries.

Thank you

Answer 1

Use specialization:

    template<> 
    class Array1D<uchar>
    {
        Array1D<uchar>& operator += (const uchar& a)
        {
        // special behaviour
        }
    };

But if you dont want to rewrite all other functions in Array1D consider using overloading for operator+=.