Question

I have a class that uses functors as units of work. It accepts a reference to a functor in its Run() method. To allow this class to operate on any functor, all these functors must derive from my base functor class which looks like this:

class baseFunctor{

public:
    virtual void operator()()=0;
    virtual baseFunctor Clone()=0;
};

This works, however obviously it restricts these functors to having an operator method that returns void and accepts no parameters. I need to be able to accept a functor in my class that can take any type of parameters and return anything. Its apparently do-able but I can’t seem to find a way to do it. I have considered using templates, multiple inheritance, but I keep getting thwarted by the fact that the class that needs to run this functor must be able to accept any type, so will accept the base class type, and so will not know the actual type of the functor.

Any suggestions of what avenue to look at would be appreciated.

Answer 1

How will the class that calls the functor know what parameters to provide and what to do with the return value, if any?