How do I expand a tuple into variadic template fun

Question

Consider the case of a templated function with variadic template arguments:

template<typename Tret, typename... T> Tret func(const T&... t);

Now, I have a tuple t of values. How do I call func() using the tuple values as arguments? I've read about the bind() function object, with call() function, and also the apply() function in different some now-obsolete documents. The GNU GCC 4.4 implementation seems to have a call() function in the bind() class, but there is very little documentation on the subject.

Some people suggest hand-written recursive hacks, but the true value of variadic template arguments is to be able to use them in cases like above.

Does anyone have a solution to is, or hint on where to read about it?

Answer 1

This simple solution works for me:

template<typename... T>
void unwrap_tuple(std::tuple<T...>* tp)
{
    std::cout << "And here I have the tuple types, all " << sizeof...(T) << " of them" << std::endl;
}

int main()
{
    using TupleType = std::tuple<int, float, std::string, void*>;

    unwrap_tuple((TupleType*)nullptr); // trick compiler into using template param deduction
}

Answer 2

How about this:

// Warning: NOT tested!
#include <cstddef>
#include <tuple>
#include <type_traits>
#include <utility>

using std::declval;
using std::forward;
using std::get;
using std::integral_constant;
using std::size_t;
using std::tuple;

namespace detail
{
    template < typename Func, typename ...T, typename ...Args >
    auto  explode_tuple( integral_constant<size_t, 0u>, tuple<T...> const &t,
     Func &&f, Args &&...a )
     -> decltype( forward<Func>(f)(declval<T const>()...) )
    { return forward<Func>( f )( forward<Args>(a)... ); }

    template < size_t Index, typename Func, typename ...T, typename ...Args >
    auto  explode_tuple( integral_constant<size_t, Index>, tuple<T...> const&t,
     Func &&f, Args &&...a )
     -> decltype( forward<Func>(f)(declval<T const>()...) )
    {
        return explode_tuple( integral_constant<size_t, Index - 1u>{}, t,
         forward<Func>(f), get<Index - 1u>(t), forward<Args>(a)... );
    }
}

template < typename Func, typename ...T >
auto  run_tuple( Func &&f, tuple<T...> const &t )
 -> decltype( forward<Func>(f)(declval<T const>()...) )
{
    return detail::explode_tuple( integral_constant<size_t, sizeof...(T)>{}, t,
     forward<Func>(f) );
}

template < typename Tret, typename ...T >
Tret  func_T( tuple<T...> const &t )
{ return run_tuple( &func<Tret, T...>, t ); }

The run_tuple function template takes the given tuple and pass its elements individually to the given function. It carries out its work by recursively calling its helper function templates explode_tuple. It's important that run_tuple passes the tuple's size to explode_tuple; that number acts as a counter for how many elements to extract.

If the tuple is empty, then run_tuple calls the first version of explode_tuple with the remote function as the only other argument. The remote function is called with no arguments and we're done. If the tuple is not empty, a higher number is passed to the second version of explode_tuple, along with the remote function. A recursive call to explode_tuple is made, with the same arguments, except the counter number is decreased by one and (a reference to) the last tuple element is tacked on as an argument after the remote function. In a recursive call, either the counter isn't zero, and another call is made with the counter decreased again and the next-unreferenced element is inserted in the argument list after the remote function but before the other inserted arguments, or the counter reaches zero and the remote function is called with all the arguments accumulated after it.

I'm not sure I have the syntax of forcing a particular version of a function template right. I think you can use a pointer-to-function as a function object; the compiler will automatically fix it.

Answer 3

All this implementations are good. But due to use of pointer to member function compiler often cannot inline the target function call (at least gcc 4.8 can't, no matter what Why gcc can't inline function pointers that can be determined?)

But things changes if send pointer to member function as template arguments, not as function params:

/// from https://stackoverflow.com/a/9288547/1559666
template<int ...> struct seq {};
template<int N, int ...S> struct gens : gens<N-1, N-1, S...> {};
template<int ...S> struct gens<0, S...>{ typedef seq<S...> type; };

template<typename TT>
using makeSeq = typename gens< std::tuple_size< typename std::decay<TT>::type >::value >::type;


// deduce function return type
template<class ...Args>
struct fn_type;

template<class ...Args>
struct fn_type< std::tuple<Args...> >{

    // will not be called
    template<class Self, class Fn>
    static auto type_helper(Self &self, Fn f) -> decltype((self.*f)(declval<Args>()...)){
        //return (self.*f)(Args()...);
        return NULL;
    }
};

template<class Self, class ...Args>
struct APPLY_TUPLE{};

template<class Self, class ...Args>
struct APPLY_TUPLE<Self, std::tuple<Args...>>{
    Self &self;
    APPLY_TUPLE(Self &self): self(self){}

    template<class T, T (Self::* f)(Args...),  class Tuple>
    void delayed_call(Tuple &&list){
        caller<T, f, Tuple >(forward<Tuple>(list), makeSeq<Tuple>() );
    }

    template<class T, T (Self::* f)(Args...), class Tuple, int ...S>
    void caller(Tuple &&list, const seq<S...>){
        (self.*f)( std::get<S>(forward<Tuple>(list))... );
    }
};

#define type_of(val) typename decay<decltype(val)>::type

#define apply_tuple(obj, fname, tuple) \
    APPLY_TUPLE<typename decay<decltype(obj)>::type, typename decay<decltype(tuple)>::type >(obj).delayed_call< \
            decltype( fn_type< type_of(tuple) >::type_helper(obj, &decay<decltype(obj)>::type::fname) ), \
            &decay<decltype(obj)>::type::fname \
            > \
            (tuple);

And ussage:

struct DelayedCall
{  
    void call_me(int a, int b, int c){
        std::cout << a+b+c;
    }

    void fire(){
        tuple<int,int,int> list = make_tuple(1,2,3);
        apply_tuple(*this, call_me, list); // even simpler than previous implementations
    }
};

Proof of inlinable http://goo.gl/5UqVnC

---

With small changes, we can "overload" apply_tuple:

#define VA_NARGS_IMPL(_1, _2, _3, _4, _5, _6, _7, _8, N, ...) N
#define VA_NARGS(...) VA_NARGS_IMPL(X,##__VA_ARGS__, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0)
#define VARARG_IMPL_(base, count, ...) base##count(__VA_ARGS__)
#define VARARG_IMPL(base, count, ...) VARARG_IMPL_(base, count, __VA_ARGS__)
#define VARARG(base, ...) VARARG_IMPL(base, VA_NARGS(__VA_ARGS__), __VA_ARGS__)

#define apply_tuple2(fname, tuple) apply_tuple3(*this, fname, tuple)
#define apply_tuple3(obj, fname, tuple) \
    APPLY_TUPLE<typename decay<decltype(obj)>::type, typename decay<decltype(tuple)>::type >(obj).delayed_call< \
            decltype( fn_type< type_of(tuple) >::type_helper(obj, &decay<decltype(obj)>::type::fname) ), \
            &decay<decltype(obj)>::type::fname \
            /* ,decltype(tuple) */> \
            (tuple);
#define apply_tuple(...) VARARG(apply_tuple, __VA_ARGS__)

...

apply_tuple(obj, call_me, list);
apply_tuple(call_me, list);       // call this->call_me(list....)

---

Plus this is the only one solution which works with templated functions.

Answer 4

I am evaluating MSVS 2013RC, and it failed to compile some of the previous solutions proposed here in some cases. For example, MSVS will fail to compile "auto" returns if there are too many function parameters, because of a namespace imbrication limit (I sent that info to Microsoft to have it corrected). In other cases, we need access to the function's return, although that can also be done with a lamda: the following two examples give the same result..

apply_tuple([&ret1](double a){ret1 = cos(a); }, std::make_tuple<double>(.2));
ret2 = apply_tuple((double(*)(double))cos, std::make_tuple<double>(.2));

And thanks again to those who posted answers here before me, I wouldn't have gotten to this without it... so here it is:

template<size_t N>
struct apply_impl {
    template<typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(F&& f, T&& t, A&&... a)
    -> decltype(apply_impl<N-1>::apply_tuple(std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t),
                          std::get<N-1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return apply_impl<N-1>::apply_tuple(std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t),
                          std::get<N-1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
    template<typename C, typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(C*const o, F&& f, T&& t, A&&... a)
    -> decltype(apply_impl<N-1>::apply_tuple(o, std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t),
                          std::get<N-1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return apply_impl<N-1>::apply_tuple(o, std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t),
                          std::get<N-1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
};

// This is a work-around for MSVS 2013RC that is required in some cases
#if _MSC_VER <= 1800 /* update this when bug is corrected */
template<>
struct apply_impl<6> {
    template<typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(F&& f, T&& t, A&&... a)
    -> decltype(std::forward<F>(f)(std::get<0>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<2>(std::forward<T>(t)),
           std::get<3>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<4>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<5>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return std::forward<F>(f)(std::get<0>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<2>(std::forward<T>(t)),
           std::get<3>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<4>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<5>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
    template<typename C, typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(C*const o, F&& f, T&& t, A&&... a)
    -> decltype((o->*std::forward<F>(f))(std::get<0>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<2>(std::forward<T>(t)),
           std::get<3>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<4>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<5>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return (o->*std::forward<F>(f))(std::get<0>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<1>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<2>(std::forward<T>(t)),
           std::get<3>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<4>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::get<5>(std::forward<T>(t)), std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
};
#endif

template<>
struct apply_impl<0> {
    template<typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(F&& f, T&&, A&&... a)
    -> decltype(std::forward<F>(f)(std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return std::forward<F>(f)(std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
    template<typename C, typename F, typename T, typename... A>
    static inline auto apply_tuple(C*const o, F&& f, T&&, A&&... a)
    -> decltype((o->*std::forward<F>(f))(std::forward<A>(a)...)) {
         return (o->*std::forward<F>(f))(std::forward<A>(a)...);
    }
};

// Apply tuple parameters on a non-member or static-member function by perfect forwarding
template<typename F, typename T>
inline auto apply_tuple(F&& f, T&& t)
-> decltype(apply_impl<std::tuple_size<typename std::decay<T>::type>::value>::apply_tuple(std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t))) {
     return apply_impl<std::tuple_size<typename std::decay<T>::type>::value>::apply_tuple(std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t));
}

// Apply tuple parameters on a member function
template<typename C, typename F, typename T>
inline auto apply_tuple(C*const o, F&& f, T&& t)
-> decltype(apply_impl<std::tuple_size<typename std::decay<T>::type>::value>::apply_tuple(o, std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t))) {
     return apply_impl<std::tuple_size<typename std::decay<T>::type>::value>::apply_tuple(o, std::forward<F>(f), std::forward<T>(t));
}

Answer 5

Why not just wrap your variadic arguments into a tuple class and then use compile time recursion (see link) to retrieve the index you are interested in. I find that unpacking variadic templates into a container or collection may not be type safe w.r.t. heterogeneous types

template<typename... Args>
auto get_args_as_tuple(Args... args) -> std::tuple<Args...> 
{
    return std::make_tuple(args);
}

Answer 6

Here's my code if anyone is interested

Basically at compile time the compiler will recursively unroll all arguments in various inclusive function calls <N> -> calls <N-1> -> calls ... -> calls <0> which is the last one and the compiler will optimize away the various intermediate function calls to only keep the last one which is the equivalent of func(arg1, arg2, arg3, ...)

Provided are 2 versions, one for a function called on an object and the other for a static function.

#include <tr1/tuple>

/**
 * Object Function Tuple Argument Unpacking
 *
 * This recursive template unpacks the tuple parameters into
 * variadic template arguments until we reach the count of 0 where the function
 * is called with the correct parameters
 *
 * @tparam N Number of tuple arguments to unroll
 *
 * @ingroup g_util_tuple
 */
template < uint N >
struct apply_obj_func
{
  template < typename T, typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT, typename... Args >
  static void applyTuple( T* pObj,
                          void (T::*f)( ArgsF... ),
                          const std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...>& t,
                          Args... args )
  {
    apply_obj_func<N-1>::applyTuple( pObj, f, t, std::tr1::get<N-1>( t ), args... );
  }
};

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/**
 * Object Function Tuple Argument Unpacking End Point
 *
 * This recursive template unpacks the tuple parameters into
 * variadic template arguments until we reach the count of 0 where the function
 * is called with the correct parameters
 *
 * @ingroup g_util_tuple
 */
template <>
struct apply_obj_func<0>
{
  template < typename T, typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT, typename... Args >
  static void applyTuple( T* pObj,
                          void (T::*f)( ArgsF... ),
                          const std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...>& /* t */,
                          Args... args )
  {
    (pObj->*f)( args... );
  }
};

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/**
 * Object Function Call Forwarding Using Tuple Pack Parameters
 */
// Actual apply function
template < typename T, typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT >
void applyTuple( T* pObj,
                 void (T::*f)( ArgsF... ),
                 std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...> const& t )
{
   apply_obj_func<sizeof...(ArgsT)>::applyTuple( pObj, f, t );
}

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/**
 * Static Function Tuple Argument Unpacking
 *
 * This recursive template unpacks the tuple parameters into
 * variadic template arguments until we reach the count of 0 where the function
 * is called with the correct parameters
 *
 * @tparam N Number of tuple arguments to unroll
 *
 * @ingroup g_util_tuple
 */
template < uint N >
struct apply_func
{
  template < typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT, typename... Args >
  static void applyTuple( void (*f)( ArgsF... ),
                          const std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...>& t,
                          Args... args )
  {
    apply_func<N-1>::applyTuple( f, t, std::tr1::get<N-1>( t ), args... );
  }
};

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/**
 * Static Function Tuple Argument Unpacking End Point
 *
 * This recursive template unpacks the tuple parameters into
 * variadic template arguments until we reach the count of 0 where the function
 * is called with the correct parameters
 *
 * @ingroup g_util_tuple
 */
template <>
struct apply_func<0>
{
  template < typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT, typename... Args >
  static void applyTuple( void (*f)( ArgsF... ),
                          const std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...>& /* t */,
                          Args... args )
  {
    f( args... );
  }
};

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/**
 * Static Function Call Forwarding Using Tuple Pack Parameters
 */
// Actual apply function
template < typename... ArgsF, typename... ArgsT >
void applyTuple( void (*f)(ArgsF...),
                 std::tr1::tuple<ArgsT...> const& t )
{
   apply_func<sizeof...(ArgsT)>::applyTuple( f, t );
}

// ***************************************
// Usage
// ***************************************

template < typename T, typename... Args >
class Message : public IMessage
{

  typedef void (T::*F)( Args... args );

public:

  Message( const std::string& name,
           T& obj,
           F pFunc,
           Args... args );

private:

  virtual void doDispatch( );

  T*  pObj_;
  F   pFunc_;
  std::tr1::tuple<Args...> args_;
};

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

template < typename T, typename... Args >
Message<T, Args...>::Message( const std::string& name,
                              T& obj,
                              F pFunc,
                              Args... args )
: IMessage( name ),
  pObj_( &obj ),
  pFunc_( pFunc ),
  args_( std::forward<Args>(args)... )
{

}

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

template < typename T, typename... Args >
void Message<T, Args...>::doDispatch( )
{
  try
  {
    applyTuple( pObj_, pFunc_, args_ );
  }
  catch ( std::exception& e )
  {

  }
}