What is a C++ delegate?

Question

What is the general idea of a delegate in C++? What are they, how are they used and what are they used for?

I'd like to first learn about them in a 'black box' way, but a bit of information on the guts of these things would be great too.

This is not C++ at its purest or cleanest, but I notice that the codebase where I work has them in abundance. I'm hoping to understand them enough, so I can just use them and not have to delve into the horrible nested template awfulness.

These two The Code Project articles explain what I mean but not particularly succinctly:

• Member Function Pointers and the Fastest Possible C++ Delegates

• The Impossibly Fast C++ Delegates

Answer 1

You have an incredible number of choices to achieve delegates in C++. Here are the ones that came to my mind.

---

Option 1 : functors:

A function object may be created by implementing operator()

struct Functor
{
     // Normal class/struct members

     int operator()(double d) // Arbitrary return types and parameter list
     {
          return (int) d + 1;
     }
};

// Use:
Functor f;
int i = f(3.14);

---

Option 2: lambda expressions (C++11 only)

// Syntax is roughly: [capture](parameter list) -> return type {block}
// Some shortcuts exist
auto func = [](int i) -> double { return 2*i/1.15; };
double d = func(1);

---

Option 3: function pointers

int f(double d) { ... }
typedef int (*MyFuncT) (double d);
MyFuncT fp = &f;
int a = fp(3.14);

---

Option 4: pointer to member functions (fastest solution)

See Fast C++ Delegate (on The Code Project).

struct DelegateList
{
     int f1(double d) { }
     int f2(double d) { }
};

typedef int (DelegateList::* DelegateType)(double d);

DelegateType d = &DelegateList::f1;
DelegateList list;
int a = (list.*d)(3.14);

---

Option 5: std::function

(or boost::function if your standard library doesn't support it). It is slower, but it is the most flexible.

#include <functional>
std::function<int(double)> f = [can be set to about anything in this answer]
// Usually more useful as a parameter to another functions

---

Option 6: binding (using std::bind)

Allows setting some parameters in advance, convenient to call a member function for instance.

struct MyClass
{
    int DoStuff(double d); // actually a DoStuff(MyClass* this, double d)
};

std::function<int(double d)> f = std::bind(&MyClass::DoStuff, this, std::placeholders::_1);
// auto f = std::bind(...); in C++11

---

Option 7: templates

Accept anything as long as it matches the argument list.

template <class FunctionT>
int DoSomething(FunctionT func)
{
    return func(3.14);
}