A container library for C - A C container library overview

Oct 1, 2026

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This document describes a C language container library and defines its interfaces, vocabulary, and operational semantics. It introduces design goals such as error analysis, a full feature set, abstraction, performance, and compile-time checking. It outlines normative sections and presents container types including linked lists, vector-like flexible arrays, numeric arrays, string collections, bit strings, dictionaries, hash tables, AVL and scapegoat trees, Bloom filters, queues, deques, buffers, and priority queues. It also specifies common container operations such as create, destroy, add, remove, retrieve, sort, copy, save/load, replace, iterate, flags, size queries, and memory management.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryTechnology

FormatPDF

Pages365

Reading Time15 h 20 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Design goals

Overview

The common vocabulary: iGenericContainer

Creation and destruction

Adding, removing, retrieving

Sorting, copying, saving and loading

Looping and state/size functions

Memory management

The auxiliary interfaces

Masks

Memory management

A container library for C Jacob Navia Contents 1 Introduction 17 1.1 Design goals .................................. 19 1.1.1 Error analysis ............................. 19 1.1.2 Full feature set ............................ 20 1.1.3 Abstraction .............................. 21 1.1.4 Performance .............................. 21 1.1.5 Compile time checking ........................ 21 1.2 How the functions are speci􀀌ed in this document.............. 22 1.3 Which sections of this document are normative? .............. 22 2 Overview 25 2.1 Containers ................................... 25 2.2 The two types of interface .......................... 27 2.3 The interface concept ............................. 29 2.4 Error handling ................................ 29 2.4.1 Return code .............................. 30 2.5 Naming conventions .............................. 31 2.5.1 Container Names ........................... 31 2.5.2 Interface object name ......................... 31 2.6 The di􀀋erent containers ........................... 32 2.6.1 Single and double linked lists .................... 34 Single linked lists of byte or wide character strings ......... 34 2.6.2 Flexible arrays (vector) ........................ 34 2.6.3 ValArray: Arrays of numbers .................... 35 2.6.4 String collection ............................ 35 2.6.5 Bit-string ............................... 36 2.6.6 Dictionary ............................... 36 2.6.7 Hash Table .............................. 36 2.6.8 AVL trees ............................... 37 2.6.9 Scapegoat trees ............................ 37 2.6.10 Bloom Filter .............................. 37 2.6.11 Queue ................................. 37 2.6.12 Deque ................................. 37 2.6.13 Bu􀀋ers ................................. 37 2.6.14 Priority Queues ............................ 38 2.6.15 At a glance .............................. 38 3 The common vocabulary: iGenericContainer 39 3.1 Creation of a container: Create ....................... 39 3.2 Destruction of a container: Clear and Finalize ............... 41 3.2.1 Other creation functions ....................... 41 3.3 Adding an element to a container: Add and AddRange .......... 42 3.4 Removing elements from a container .................... 43 3.4.1 Using an element as key ....................... 43 3.4.2 Removing at a given position .................... 43 3.4.3 Using a container as a stack ..................... 43 3.4.4 Batch removing ............................ 44 3.5 Retrieving elements .............................. 44 3.6 Using masks .................................. 44 3.7 Sorting a sequential container: Sort ..................... 45 3.8 Copying a container: Copy .......................... 45 3.9 Saving and loading a container to or from disk: Save and Load ...... 46 3.10 Inserting a container into another ...................... 46 3.10.1 Sequential containers ......................... 46 3.10.2 Associative containers ........................ 46 3.11 Replace an element with another ...................... 47 3.11.1 Sequential containers: ReplaceAt .................. 47 3.11.2 Associative containers: Replace ................... 47 3.12 Looping through all elements of a container ................ 47 3.12.1 Using a simple loop to iterate a container .............. 48 3.12.2 Using the Apply function....................... 48 3.12.3 Using iterators ............................ 48 3.13 Setting and retrieving the state: GetFlags and SetFlags .......... 50 3.14 Retrieving the number of elements stored: Size ............... 51 3.15 Sizes ...................................... 51 3.15.1 Sizeof ................................. 51 3.15.2 SizeofIterator ............................. 51 3.16 Memory management ............................. 51 3.16.1 Memory manager objects ..................

FAQs

What design goals guide the C container library?

The document highlights error analysis, a full feature set, abstraction, performance, and compile-time checking as key design goals.

Which container types are covered in the overview?

It covers linked lists, flexible arrays (vector), number and string collections, bit strings, dictionaries, hash tables, tree variants (AVL and scapegoat), Bloom filter, queues/deques, buffers, and priority queues.

What core operations does iGenericContainer provide?

It defines common functions for creating and destroying containers, adding and removing elements, retrieving and iterating, sorting, copying, saving/loading, replacing elements, and handling state flags and size queries.

Oct 1, 2026

Upload by asda1da