假设我有下面的类X,我想返回一个内部成员的访问:

class Z
{
    // details
};

class X
{
    std::vector<Z> vecZ;

public:
    Z& Z(size_t index)
    {
        // massive amounts of code for validating index

        Z& ret = vecZ[index];

        // even more code for determining that the Z instance
        // at index is *exactly* the right sort of Z (a process
        // which involves calculating leap years in which
        // religious holidays fall on Tuesdays for
        // the next thousand years or so)

        return ret;
    }
    const Z& Z(size_t index) const
    {
        // identical to non-const X::Z(), except printed in
        // a lighter shade of gray since
        // we're running low on toner by this point
    }
};

两个成员函数X::Z()和X::Z() const在大括号内具有相同的代码。这是重复的代码,可能会导致具有复杂逻辑的长函数的维护问题。

有办法避免这种代码重复吗?


当前回答

虽然这里的大多数答案都建议使用const_cast, CppCoreGuidelines有一个章节是关于这个的:

相反,更喜欢共享实现。通常,你可以让非const函数调用const函数。然而,当存在复杂的逻辑时,这可能导致以下模式,仍然诉诸于const_cast:

class Foo {
public:
    // not great, non-const calls const version but resorts to const_cast
    Bar& get_bar()
    {
        return const_cast<Bar&>(static_cast<const Foo&>(*this).get_bar());
    }
    const Bar& get_bar() const
    {
        /* the complex logic around getting a const reference to my_bar */
    }
private:
    Bar my_bar;
};

尽管这种模式在正确应用时是安全的,因为 调用者必须一开始就有一个非const对象,这并不理想 因为安全很难作为检查规则自动执行。 相反,更倾向于将公共代码放在公共helper函数中—— 让它成为一个模板,这样它就可以推导出const。这个不需要任何东西 Const_cast:

class Foo {
public:                         // good
          Bar& get_bar()       { return get_bar_impl(*this); }
    const Bar& get_bar() const { return get_bar_impl(*this); }
private:
    Bar my_bar;

    template<class T>           // good, deduces whether T is const or non-const
    static auto& get_bar_impl(T& t)
        { /* the complex logic around getting a possibly-const reference to my_bar */ }
};

注意:不要在模板中做大量不依赖的工作,这会导致代码膨胀。例如,如果get_bar_impl的全部或部分可以是非依赖的,并分解成一个公共的非模板函数,则可以进一步改进,从而可能大大减少代码大小。

其他回答

比Meyers说得啰嗦一点,但我可能会这样做:

class X {

    private:

    // This method MUST NOT be called except from boilerplate accessors.
    Z &_getZ(size_t index) const {
        return something;
    }

    // boilerplate accessors
    public:
    Z &getZ(size_t index)             { return _getZ(index); }
    const Z &getZ(size_t index) const { return _getZ(index); }
};

私有方法有一个不受欢迎的属性,它为const实例返回一个非const的Z&,这就是为什么它是私有的。私有方法可能会破坏外部接口的不变量(在这种情况下,所需的不变量是“一个const对象不能通过引用它所拥有的对象来修改”)。

Note that the comments are part of the pattern - _getZ's interface specifies that it is never valid to call it (aside from the accessors, obviously): there's no conceivable benefit to doing so anyway, because it's 1 more character to type and won't result in smaller or faster code. Calling the method is equivalent to calling one of the accessors with a const_cast, and you wouldn't want to do that either. If you're worried about making errors obvious (and that's a fair goal), then call it const_cast_getZ instead of _getZ.

顺便说一下,我很欣赏梅耶斯的解决方案。我对此没有哲学上的异议。不过,就我个人而言,我更喜欢一点点受控的重复,以及只能在某些严格控制的情况下调用的私有方法,而不是看起来像线噪声的方法。选择你的毒药并坚持下去。

[Edit: Kevin has rightly pointed out that _getZ might want to call a further method (say generateZ) which is const-specialised in the same way getZ is. In this case, _getZ would see a const Z& and have to const_cast it before return. That's still safe, since the boilerplate accessor polices everything, but it's not outstandingly obvious that it's safe. Furthermore, if you do that and then later change generateZ to always return const, then you also need to change getZ to always return const, but the compiler won't tell you that you do.

That latter point about the compiler is also true of Meyers's recommended pattern, but the first point about a non-obvious const_cast isn't. So on balance I think that if _getZ turns out to need a const_cast for its return value, then this pattern loses a lot of its value over Meyers's. Since it also suffers disadvantages compared to Meyers's, I think I would switch to his in that situation. Refactoring from one to the other is easy -- it doesn't affect any other valid code in the class, since only invalid code and the boilerplate calls _getZ.]

c++ 17更新了这个问题的最佳答案:

T const & f() const {
    return something_complicated();
}
T & f() {
    return const_cast<T &>(std::as_const(*this).f());
}

这样做的好处是:

很明显发生了什么 有最小的代码开销——它适合单行 很难出错(只能抛弃不稳定的偶然,但不稳定是一个罕见的限定词)

如果你想要走完整的演绎路线,那么可以通过一个辅助函数来完成

template<typename T>
constexpr T & as_mutable(T const & value) noexcept {
    return const_cast<T &>(value);
}
template<typename T>
constexpr T * as_mutable(T const * value) noexcept {
    return const_cast<T *>(value);
}
template<typename T>
constexpr T * as_mutable(T * value) noexcept {
    return value;
}
template<typename T>
void as_mutable(T const &&) = delete;

现在你甚至不能搞混volatile,它的用法看起来就像

decltype(auto) f() const {
    return something_complicated();
}
decltype(auto) f() {
    return as_mutable(std::as_const(*this).f());
}

我这样做是为了一个朋友,他合理地证明了const_cast的使用…如果我不知道,我可能会这样做(不太优雅):

#include <iostream>

class MyClass
{

public:

    int getI()
    {
        std::cout << "non-const getter" << std::endl;
        return privateGetI<MyClass, int>(*this);
    }

    const int getI() const
    {
        std::cout << "const getter" << std::endl;
        return privateGetI<const MyClass, const int>(*this);
    }

private:

    template <class C, typename T>
    static T privateGetI(C c)
    {
        //do my stuff
        return c._i;
    }

    int _i;
};

int main()
{
    const MyClass myConstClass = MyClass();
    myConstClass.getI();

    MyClass myNonConstClass;
    myNonConstClass.getI();

    return 0;
}

通常,需要使用const版本和非const版本的成员函数是getter和setter。大多数时候它们都是一行程序,所以代码复制不是问题。

要添加到jwfearn和kevin提供的解决方案,下面是函数返回shared_ptr时对应的解决方案:

struct C {
  shared_ptr<const char> get() const {
    return c;
  }
  shared_ptr<char> get() {
    return const_pointer_cast<char>(static_cast<const C &>(*this).get());
  }
  shared_ptr<char> c;
};