Changes between Initial Version and Version 1 of code/doc/MultiType

Timestamp:

Sep 22, 2008, 7:45:24 PM (17 years ago)

Author:

landauf

Comment:

—

code/doc/MultiType

@@ +1 @@
+= MultiType =
+[[TracNav(TracNav/TOC_Development)]]
+[[TOC]]
+
+== Introduction ==
+
+The MultiType is a fancy class, designed to accept values of almost every type and to return exactly this value in almost every other type - depending on your needs. This allows you to assign a string, for example "105.3", to a MultiType and to let the MultiType return 105.3 as a float.
+
+But what is this good for? Well, just think of an XML level. You write all values as strings, the [wiki:Loader] loads the level, creates new objects and passes the values to the objects. But how should the Loader know, which type a value has? It just loads a string! Thats why the Loader puts the string into a MultiType and passes it to the new object. The object receives the MultiType and C++ does an implicit conversion to the requested type.
+
+== Example ==
+This is what you got: 
+{{{
+SomeType value = XXXX; // a value
+
+void function(OtherType value); // a function
+}}}
+
+This is what you want:
+{{{
+function(value); // call the function with the value
+}}}
+
+This is what you know about SomeType and OtherType:
+{{{
+// nothing
+}}}
+
+This is how you're doing it:
+{{{
+function(MultiType(value));
+}}}
+Isn't it cool? Sure it is!
+
+== Usage ==
+It's important to know the MultiType has some sort of an internal type.
+
+
+== Types ==
+Of course SomeType and OtherType from the example above can't be anything, otherwise the class would be called AnyType and probably being useless.
+
+These are the types supported by MultiType:
+
+ * All primitives:
+  * char
+  * unsigned char
+  * short
+  * unsigned short
+  * int
+  * unsigned int
+  * long
+  * unsigned long
+  * long long
+  * unsigned long long
+  * float
+  * double
+  * long double
+  * bool
+ * All pointers (but be careful with inheritance, in fact it's just handled as a void pointer)
+ * std::string
+ * Math objects:
+  * Vector2
+  * Vector3
+  * Vector4
+  * Quaternion
+  * ColourValue
+  * Radian
+  * Degree