Sequence-zip function for c++11?

Question

With the new range-based for loop we can write code like

for(auto x: Y) {}

Which IMO is a huge improvement from (for ex.)

for(std::vector<int>::iterator x=Y.begin(); x!=Y.end(); ++x) {}

Can it be used to loop over two simultaneous loops, like Pythons zip function? For those unfamiliar with Python, the code:

Y1 = [1,2,3]
Y2 = [4,5,6,7]
for x1,x2 in zip(Y1,Y2):
    print x1,x2

Gives as output (1,4) (2,5) (3,6)

Answer 1

// declare a, b
BOOST_FOREACH(boost::tie(a, b), boost::combine(list_of_a, list_of_b)){
    // your code here.
}

Answer 2

Warning: boost::zip_iterator and boost::combine as of Boost 1.63.0 (2016 Dec 26) will cause undefined behavior if the length of the input containers are not the same (it may crash or iterate beyond the end).

---

Starting from Boost 1.56.0 (2014 Aug 7) you could use boost::combine (the function exists in earlier versions but undocumented):

#include <boost/range/combine.hpp>
#include <vector>
#include <list>
#include <string>

int main() {
    std::vector<int> a {4, 5, 6};
    double b[] = {7, 8, 9};
    std::list<std::string> c {"a", "b", "c"};
    for (auto tup : boost::combine(a, b, c, a)) {    // <---
        int x, w;
        double y;
        std::string z;
        boost::tie(x, y, z, w) = tup;
        printf("%d %g %s %d\n", x, y, z.c_str(), w);
    }
}

This would print

4 7 a 4
5 8 b 5
6 9 c 6

---

In earlier versions, you could define a range yourself like this:

#include <boost/iterator/zip_iterator.hpp>
#include <boost/range.hpp>

template <typename... T>
auto zip(T&&... containers) -> boost::iterator_range<boost::zip_iterator<decltype(boost::make_tuple(std::begin(containers)...))>>
{
    auto zip_begin = boost::make_zip_iterator(boost::make_tuple(std::begin(containers)...));
    auto zip_end = boost::make_zip_iterator(boost::make_tuple(std::end(containers)...));
    return boost::make_iterator_range(zip_begin, zip_end);
}

The usage is the same.

Answer 3

See <redi/zip.h> for a zip function which works with range-base for and accepts any number of ranges, which can be rvalues or lvalues and can be different lengths (iteration will stop at the end of the shortest range).

std::vector<int> vi{ 0, 2, 4 };
std::vector<std::string> vs{ "1", "3", "5", "7" };
for (auto i : redi::zip(vi, vs))
  std::cout << i.get<0>() << ' ' << i.get<1>() << ' ';

Prints 0 1 2 3 4 5

Answer 4

std::transform can do this trivially:

std::vector<int> a = {1,2,3,4,5};
std::vector<int> b = {1,2,3,4,5};
std::vector<int>c;
std::transform(a.begin(),a.end(), b.begin(),
               std::back_inserter(c),
               [](const auto& aa, const auto& bb)
               {
                   return aa*bb;
               });
for(auto cc:c)
    std::cout<<cc<<std::endl;

If the second sequence is shorter, my implementation seems to be giving default initialized values.

Answer 5

If you have a C++14 compliant compiler (e.g. gcc5) you can use zip provided in the cppitertools library by Ryan Haining, which looks really promising:

array<int,4> i{{1,2,3,4}};
vector<float> f{1.2,1.4,12.3,4.5,9.9};
vector<string> s{"i","like","apples","alot","dude"};
array<double,5> d{{1.2,1.2,1.2,1.2,1.2}};

for (auto&& e : zip(i,f,s,d)) {
    cout << std::get<0>(e) << ' '
         << std::get<1>(e) << ' '
         << std::get<2>(e) << ' '
         << std::get<3>(e) << '\n';
    std::get<1>(e)=2.2f; // modifies the underlying 'f' array
}

Answer 6

You can use a solution based on boost::zip_iterator. Make a phony container class maintaining references to your containers, and which return zip_iterator from the begin and end member functions. Now you can write

for (auto p: zip(c1, c2)) { ... }

Example implementation (please test):

#include <iterator>
#include <boost/iterator/zip_iterator.hpp>

template <typename C1, typename C2>
class zip_container
{
    C1* c1; C2* c2;

    typedef boost::tuple<
        decltype(std::begin(*c1)), 
        decltype(std::begin(*c2))
    > tuple;

public:
    zip_container(C1& c1, C2& c2) : c1(&c1), c2(&c2) {}

    typedef boost::zip_iterator<tuple> iterator;

    iterator begin() const
    {
         return iterator(std::begin(*c1), std::begin(*c2));
    }

    iterator end() const
    {
         return iterator(std::end(*c1), std::end(*c2));
    }
};

template <typename C1, typename C2>
zip_container<C1, C2> zip(C1& c1, C2& c2)
{
    return zip_container<C1, C2>(c1, c2);
}

I leave the variadic version as an excellent exercise to the reader.