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/****************************************************************************
**
** Copyright (C) 2011 Nokia Corporation and/or its subsidiary(-ies).
** All rights reserved.
** Contact: Nokia Corporation (qt-info@nokia.com)
**
** This file is part of the documentation of the Qt Toolkit.
**
** $QT_BEGIN_LICENSE:FDL$
** No Commercial Usage
** This file contains pre-release code and may not be distributed.
** You may use this file in accordance with the terms and conditions
** contained in the Technology Preview License Agreement accompanying
** this package.
**
** GNU Free Documentation License
** Alternatively, this file may be used under the terms of the GNU Free
** Documentation License version 1.3 as published by the Free Software
** Foundation and appearing in the file included in the packaging of this
** file.
**
** If you have questions regarding the use of this file, please contact
** Nokia at qt-info@nokia.com.
** $QT_END_LICENSE$
**
****************************************************************************/
/*!
\page templates.html
\title Why Doesn't Qt Use Templates for Signals and Slots?
\brief The reasoning behind Qt's implementation of signals and slots.
Templates are a builtin mechanism in C++ that allows the compiler to
generate code on the fly, depending on the type of the arguments
passed. As such, templates are highly interesting to framework
creators, and we do use advanced templates in many places
in Qt. However, there are limitations: There are things that you can
easily express with templates, and there are things that are
impossible to express with templates. A generic vector container class
is easily expressible, even with partial specialisation for pointer
types, while a function that sets up a graphical user interface based
on a XML description given as a string is not expressible as
template. And then there is gray area in between. Things that you can
hack with templates at the cost of code size, readability,
portability, usability, extensability, robustness and ultimately
design beauty. Both templates and the C preprocessor can be stretched
to do incredibility smart and mind boggling things. But just because
those things can be done, does not necessarily mean doing them is the
right design choice.
There is an important practical challenge we have to mention: due to
the inadequacies of various compilers it is still not possible to
fully exploit the template mechanism in cross-platform
applications. Code unfortunately is not meant to be published in
books, but compiled with real-world compilers on real-world operating
system. Even today, many widely used C++ compilers have problems with
advanced templates. For example, you cannot safely rely on partial
template specialisation, which is essential for some non-trivial
problem domains. Some compilers also have limitations with regards to
template member functions, which make it hard to combine generic
programming with object orientated programming. However, we do not
perceive these problems as a serious limitation in our work. Even if
all our users had access to a fully standards compliant modern C++
compiler with excellent template support, we would not abandon the
string-based approach used by our meta object compiler for a template
based signals and slots system. Here are five reasons why:
\section1 Syntax matters
Syntax isn't just sugar: the syntax we use to express our algorithms can
significantly affect the readability and maintainability of our code.
The syntax used for Qt's signals and slots has proved very successful in
practice. The syntax is intuitive, simple to use and easy to read.
People learning Qt find the syntax helps them understand and utilize the
signals and slots concept -- despite its highly abstract and generic
nature. Furthermore, declaring signals in class definitions ensures that
the signals are protected in the sense of protected C++ member
functions. This helps programmers get their design right from the very
beginning, without even having to think about design patterns.
\section1 Code Generators are Good
Qt's \c{moc} (Meta Object Compiler) provides a clean way to go
beyond the compiled language's facilities. It does so by generating
additional C++ code which can be compiled by any standard C++ compiler.
The \c{moc} reads C++ source files. If it finds one or more class
declarations that contain the Q_OBJECT macro, it produces another C++
source file which contains the meta object code for those classes. The
C++ source file generated by the \c{moc} must be compiled and
linked with the implementation of the class (or it can be
\c{#included} into the class's source file). Typically \c{moc}
is not called manually, but automatically by the build system, so it
requires no additional effort by the programmer.
The \c{moc} is not the only code generator Qt is using. Another
prominent example is the \c{uic} (User Interface Compiler). It
takes a user interface description in XML and creates C++ code that
sets up the form. Outside Qt, code generators are common as well. Take
for example \c{rpc} and \c{idl}, that enable programs or
objects to communicate over process or machine boundaries. Or the vast
variety of scanner and parser generators, with \c{lex} and
\c{yacc} being the most well-known ones. They take a grammar
specification as input and generate code that implements a state
machine. The alternatives to code generators are hacked compilers,
proprietary languages or graphical programming tools with one-way
dialogs or wizards that generate obscure code during design time
rather than compile time. Rather than locking our customers into a
proprietary C++ compiler or into a particular Integrated Development
Environment, we enable them to use whatever tools they prefer. Instead
of forcing programmers to add generated code into source repositories,
we encourage them to add our tools to their build system: cleaner,
safer and more in the spirit of UNIX.
\section1 GUIs are Dynamic
C++ is a standarized, powerful and elaborate general-purpose language.
It's the only language that is exploited on such a wide range of
software projects, spanning every kind of application from entire
operating systems, database servers and high end graphics
applications to common desktop applications. One of the keys to C++'s
success is its scalable language design that focuses on maximum
performance and minimal memory consumption whilst still maintaining
ANSI C compatibility.
For all these advantages, there are some downsides. For C++, the static
object model is a clear disadvantage over the dynamic messaging approach
of Objective C when it comes to component-based graphical user interface
programming. What's good for a high end database server or an operating
system isn't necessarily the right design choice for a GUI frontend.
With \c{moc}, we have turned this disadvantage into an advantage,
and added the flexibility required to meet the challenge of safe and
efficient graphical user interface programming.
Our approach goes far beyond anything you can do with templates. For
example, we can have object properties. And we can have overloaded
signals and slots, which feels natural when programming in a language
where overloads are a key concept. Our signals add zero bytes to the
size of a class instance, which means we can add new signals without
breaking binary compatibility. Because we do not rely on excessive
inlining as done with templates, we can keep the code size smaller.
Adding new connections just expands to a simple function call rather
than a complex template function.
Another benefit is that we can explore an object's signals and slots at
runtime. We can establish connections using type-safe call-by-name,
without having to know the exact types of the objects we are connecting.
This is impossible with a template based solution. This kind of runtime
introspection opens up new possibilities, for example GUIs that are
generated and connected from Qt Designer's XML UI files.
\section1 Calling Performance is Not Everything
Qt's signals and slots implementation is not as fast as a
template-based solution. While emitting a signal is approximately the
cost of four ordinary function calls with common template
implementations, Qt requires effort comparable to about ten function
calls. This is not surprising since the Qt mechanism includes a
generic marshaller, introspection, queued calls between different
threads, and ultimately scriptability. It does not rely on excessive
inlining and code expansion and it provides unmatched runtime
safety. Qt's iterators are safe while those of faster template-based
systems are not. Even during the process of emitting a signal to
several receivers, those receivers can be deleted safely without your
program crashing. Without this safety, your application would
eventually crash with a difficult to debug free'd memory read or write
error.
Nonetheless, couldn't a template-based solution improve the performance
of an application using signals and slots? While it is true that Qt adds
a small overhead to the cost of calling a slot through a signal, the
cost of the call is only a small proportion of the entire cost of a
slot. Benchmarking against Qt's signals and slots system is typically
done with empty slots. As soon as you do anything useful in your slots,
for example a few simple string operations, the calling overhead becomes
negligible. Qt's system is so optimized that anything that requires
operator new or delete (for example, string operations or
inserting/removing something from a template container) is significantly
more expensive than emitting a signal.
Aside: If you have a signals and slots connection in a tight inner loop
of a performance critical task and you identify this connection as the
bottleneck, think about using the standard listener-interface pattern
rather than signals and slots. In cases where this occurs, you probably
only require a 1:1 connection anyway. For example, if you have an object
that downloads data from the network, it's a perfectly sensible design
to use a signal to indicate that the requested data arrived. But if you
need to send out every single byte one by one to a consumer, use a
listener interface rather than signals and slots.
\section1 No Limits
Because we had the \c{moc} for signals and slots, we could add
other useful things to it that could not be done with templates.
Among these are scoped translations via a generated \c{tr()}
function, and an advanced property system with introspection and
extended runtime type information. The property system alone is a
great advantage: a powerful and generic user interface design tool
like Qt Designer would be a lot harder to write - if not impossible -
without a powerful and introspective property system. But it does not
end here. We also provide a dynamic qobject_cast<T>() mechanism
that does not rely on the system's RTTI and thus does not share its
limitations. We use it to safely query interfaces from dynamically
loaded components. Another application domain are dynamic meta
objects. We can e.g. take ActiveX components and at runtime create a
meta object around it. Or we can export Qt components as ActiveX
components by exporting its meta object. You cannot do either of these
things with templates.
C++ with the \c{moc} essentially gives us the flexibility of
Objective-C or of a Java Runtime Environment, while maintaining C++'s
unique performance and scalability advantages. It is what makes Qt the
flexible and comfortable tool we have today.
*/
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