Instantiating the Collection Classes

To use a collection class, you normally follow these three steps:

1. Instantiate a collection class template and provide arguments for the formal template arguments.
2. Define one or more objects of this instantiated class, possibly providing constructor arguments.
3. Apply functions to these objects.

The following example describes instantiation for the default implementation. Consider the following example header file for a class Person:

//person.h - Header file containing class Person
#include <iostream.h>
#include <istring.hpp>

class Person
{
    IString PersonName;
    IString TNumber;

public:
    //constructor
    Person () : PersonName(""), TNumber("") {}

    //copy constructor
    Person(IString Name, IStringNumber)
        : PersonName(Name), TNumber(Number)
    {
    }

    IString const& GetPersonName() const { return PersonName; }
    IString const& GetTNumber() const { return TNumber; }
    IBoolean operator==(Person const& A) const
    {
        return (PersonName == A.GetPersonName())
            && (TNumber==A.GetTNumber());
    }

    IBoolean operator<(Person const& A) const
    {
        return (PersonName < A.GetPersonName());
    }
};

For a given class, such as ISet, and a given element type, such as a class named Person, the instantiation for a new class that represents sets of persons could look like this:

//main.cpp - main file
#include <iset.h>
#include <iostream.h>
#include "person.h"   //person.h from the previous example

typedef ISet<Person> AddressList;

void main()
{
    AddressList Business;
    Person A("Peter Black", "50706");
    Business.add(A);
    cout << "\nThe set now contains "
        << Business.numberOfElements() <<" entries!\n";
}

Once the AddressList collection is defined, you can define AddressList objects Family, Business, and Sportclub as follows:

AddressList Family, Business, Sportclub;

You can also define the objects without introducing a new type name (AddressList):

ISet < Person > Family, Business, Sportclub;

However, you should begin by explicitly defining a named class, such as AddressList, that uses the default implementation. It is then easier to replace the default implementation with a better implementation later on.

Introduction to the Collection Classes
Collection Class Hierarchy
Overall Implementation Structure
Collection Characteristics
Ordering of Collection Elements
Access by Key
Equality Relation
Uniqueness of Entries
Thread Safety and the Collection Classes

Class Template Naming Conventions
Possible Implementation Paths
Choosing One of the Provided Implementation Variants
Adding an Element to a Collection
Removing an Element from a Collection
Copying and Referencing Collections
Replacing the Default Implementation