C++ Template Metaprogramming: Concepts, Tools, and Techniques from Boost and Beyond

Chapter 1. Introduction

You can think of this chapter as a warm-up for the rest of the book. You’ll get a chance to exercise your tools a little and go through a short briefing on basic concepts and terminology. By the end you should have at least a vague picture of what the book is about, and (we hope) you’ll be eager to move on to bigger ideas.

1.1 Getting Started

One of the nice things about template metaprograms is a property they share with good old traditional systems: Once a metaprogram is written, it can be used without knowing what’s under the hood—as long as it works, that is.

To build your confidence in that, let us begin by presenting a tiny C++ program that simply uses a facility implemented with template metaprogramming:

    #include ...