Question

I have a bunch of functions which read completely identical except for one line of code, which is different depending on the type of input parameter.

Example:

void Func(std::vector<int> input)
{
   DoSomethingGeneral1();
   ...
   DoSomethingSpecialWithStdVector(input);
   ...
   DoSomethingGeneral2();
}

void Func(int input)
{
   DoSomethingGeneral1();
   ...
   DoSomethingSpecialWithInt(input);
   ...
   DoSomethingGeneral2();
}

void Func(std::string input)
{
   DoSomethingGeneral1();
   ...
   DoSomethingSpecialWithStdString(input);
   ...
   DoSomethingGeneral2();
}

I wonder how I could avoid this duplication using a template-like mechanism. If I understand “specialization” correctly, it does not avoid to have the code of the specialized functions twice?

Answer 1

here you go..
changed the parameters to references to avoid copies + assure you can use the changed values again in Func()

void DoSomethingSpecial( std::vector<int>& input ){}

void DoSomethingSpecial( int& input ){}

void DoSomethingSpecial( std::string& input ){}

template< typename T >
void Func( T input )
{
  DoSomethingGeneral1();
  DoSomethingSpecial(input);
  DoSomethingGeneral2();
}