README.md

lazy_thrust

Easily compose operations on ranges of values. The evaluation is delayed, thus the name "lazy".

Motivation

The boost library and the thrust library include (fancy) iterators which facilitate implicit and/or delayed computations. While these iterators help in fitting even more classes of ranges in standard algorithms, they incur a severe increase in locs. The most important examples are the following:

counting_iterator

An iterator which when evaluated returns a number in a range.

This example:

thrust::copy(
    thrust::make_counting_iterator(0),
    thrust::make_counting_iterator(10),
    std::ostream_iterator<int>(std::cout, " "));

Yields this output: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

transform_iterator

An iterator which wraps another iterator and when evaluated yields the result of the application of a unary function on the dereferenced value.

This example:

auto pow = [](int a) { return a * a };
thrust::copy(
    thrust::make_transform_iterator(thrust::make_counting_iterator(0), pow),
    thrust::make_transform_iterator(thrust::make_counting_iterator(10), pow),
    std::ostream_iterator<int>(std::cout, " "));

Yields this output: 0 1 4 9 16 25 36 49 64 81

permutation_iterator

An iterator which uses a range as indexes in another range and dereferences the latter in the order dictated by the former.

This example:

int values = [] = { 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 };
int reorder[] = { 4, 3, 2, 1, 0 };
thrust::copy(
    thrust::make_permutation_iterator(std::begin(values), std::begin(reorder)),
    thrust::make_permutation_iterator(std::begin(values), std::end(reorder)),
    std::ostream_iterator<int>(std::cout, " "));

Yields this output: 50 40 30 20 10

Bottom-line

The introduction of important features in C++11, such as lambdas, auto, decltype, variadic tempaltes, etc., introduces the ability to severely decrease the amount of code required to utilize implicit computations in iterator-based algorithms. This library aims exactly there.

Contribution

This library facilitates the quick and easy construction of lazily evaluated iterator ranges. To do so it exploits C++11 features. The main use evolves around the use of a special operand, which is overloaded over common operations in order to easily synthesize computations. Some examples follow:

Example: simple copy

thrust

int values[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

thrust::copy(std::begin(values), std::end(values), std::begin(results))

lazy_thrust

int values[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

using namespace lazy_thrust;

make_lazy(results) = make_lazy(values);

Example: simple transform

thrust

int values[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

thrust::transform(
    std::begin(values),
    std::end(values),
    std::begin(results),
    [](int i) { return 2 * i });

lazy_thrust

int values[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

using namespace lazy_thrust;

make_lazy(results) = transform(make_lazy(values), [](int i) { return 2 * i });

Example: zip transform

thrust

int values1[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values2[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values3[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

auto iter = thrust::make_zip_iterator(thrust::make_tuple(
                std::begin(values1), std::begin(values2), std::begin(values3)));

thrust::transform(
    iter, iter + 5,
    std::begin(results),
    [](const thrust::tuple<int, int, int> &t)
    { return thrust::get<0>(t) + thrust::get<1>(t) + thrust::get<2>(t) });

lazy_thrust

int values1[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values2[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values3[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

using namespace lazy_thrust;

make_lazy(results) = transform(join(make_lazy(values1),
                                    make_lazy(values2),
                                    make_lazy(values3)),
                                //  notice how the tuple is expanded into arguments
                                //  instead of a cumbersome thrust::tuple
                                [](int a, int b, int c) { return a + b + c; })

Example: common operators

thrust

int values1[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values2[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values3[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

auto iter = thrust::make_zip_iterator(thrust::make_tuple(
                std::begin(values1), std::begin(values2), std::begin(values3)));

thrust::transform(
    iter, iter + 5,
    std::begin(results),
    [](const thrust::tuple<int, int, int> &t)
    { return thrust::get<0>(t) + thrust::get<1>(t) + thrust::get<2>(t) });

lazy_thrust

int values1[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values2[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int values3[] = { 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 };
int results[5];

using namespace lazy_thrust;

make_lazy(results) = make_lazy(values1) + make_lazy(values2) + make_lazy(values3);