🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <4i9cn4$7cf@ns.hcsc.com> bill@amber.ssd.hcsc.com (Bill
Leonard) writes:

|> In article <4i8a38$2qq@engnews1.Eng.Sun.COM>, clamage@Eng.Sun.COM
|> (Steve Clamage) writes:

|> > The more general case of non-contiguous enum values could be handled
|> > by a table of value/string pairs and a lookup function. The standard
|> > "map" class will do it all for you.

|> But using the map class would require initialization at runtime, wouldn't
|> it?  That increases the startup cost of the program.  Using a sorted array
|> of value/string pairs (statically initialized) and a binary search would
|> probably be more efficient.

At start-up, yes.  If the map is large enough for this to make a
difference, however, it's likely that the difference between the O(ln n)
binary search and a O(k) hash table look-up is also significant.

Given that the enum labels are all in the source code, and programmers
being on the whole a lazy group of people, the resulting tables are
typically so small that it really doesn't make a difference, especially
since anytime that the conversion is necessary, output will follow.
(I'm still using a linear search in my implementation, and it has yet to
cause a performance bottleneck.)
-- 
James Kanze           (+33) 88 14 49 00          email: kanze@gabi-soft.fr
GABI Software, Sarl., 8 rue des Francs Bourgeois, 67000 Strasbourg, France
Conseils, itudes et rialisations en logiciel orienti objet --
              -- A la recherche d'une activiti dans une region francophone
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