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478 lines
19 KiB
ReStructuredText
{fmt}
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=====
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.. image:: https://travis-ci.org/fmtlib/fmt.png?branch=master
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:target: https://travis-ci.org/fmtlib/fmt
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.. image:: https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/status/ehjkiefde6gucy1v
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:target: https://ci.appveyor.com/project/vitaut/fmt
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.. image:: https://badges.gitter.im/Join%20Chat.svg
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:alt: Join the chat at https://gitter.im/fmtlib/fmt
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:target: https://gitter.im/fmtlib/fmt
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**{fmt}** is an open-source formatting library for C++.
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It can be used as a safe and fast alternative to (s)printf and IOStreams.
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`Documentation <http://fmtlib.net/latest/>`__
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This is a development branch that implements the C++ standards proposal `P0645
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Text Formatting <http://fmtlib.net/Text%20Formatting.html>`__.
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Released versions are available from the `Releases page
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/releases>`__.
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Features
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--------
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* Replacement-based `format API <http://fmtlib.net/dev/api.html>`_ with
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positional arguments for localization.
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* `Format string syntax <http://fmtlib.net/dev/syntax.html>`_ similar to the one
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of `str.format <https://docs.python.org/2/library/stdtypes.html#str.format>`_
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in Python.
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* Safe `printf implementation
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<http://fmtlib.net/latest/api.html#printf-formatting-functions>`_ including
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the POSIX extension for positional arguments.
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* Support for user-defined types.
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* High speed: performance of the format API is close to that of glibc's `printf
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<http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/io/c/fprintf>`_ and better than the
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performance of IOStreams. See `Speed tests`_ and
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`Fast integer to string conversion in C++
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<http://zverovich.net/2013/09/07/integer-to-string-conversion-in-cplusplus.html>`_.
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* Small code size both in terms of source code (the minimum configuration
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consists of just three header files, ``core.h``, ``format.h`` and
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``format-inl.h``) and compiled code. See `Compile time and code bloat`_.
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* Reliability: the library has an extensive set of `unit tests
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/tree/master/test>`_.
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* Safety: the library is fully type safe, errors in format strings can be
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reported at compile time, automatic memory management prevents buffer overflow
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errors.
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* Ease of use: small self-contained code base, no external dependencies,
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permissive BSD `license
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/blob/master/LICENSE.rst>`_
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* `Portability <http://fmtlib.net/latest/index.html#portability>`_ with
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consistent output across platforms and support for older compilers.
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* Clean warning-free codebase even on high warning levels
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(``-Wall -Wextra -pedantic``).
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* Support for wide strings.
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* Optional header-only configuration enabled with the ``FMT_HEADER_ONLY`` macro.
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See the `documentation <http://fmtlib.net/latest/>`_ for more details.
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Examples
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--------
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This prints ``Hello, world!`` to stdout:
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.. code:: c++
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fmt::print("Hello, {}!", "world"); // uses Python-like format string syntax
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fmt::printf("Hello, %s!", "world"); // uses printf format string syntax
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Arguments can be accessed by position and arguments' indices can be repeated:
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.. code:: c++
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std::string s = fmt::format("{0}{1}{0}", "abra", "cad");
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// s == "abracadabra"
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Format strings can be checked at compile time:
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.. code:: c++
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// test.cc
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#include <fmt/format.h>
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std::string s = fmt::format(fmt("{2}"), 42);
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.. code::
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$ g++ -Iinclude test.cc -std=c++14
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...
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test.cc:2:22: note: in instantiation of function template specialization 'fmt::format<S, int>' requested here
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std::string s = fmt::format(fmt("{2}"), 42);
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^
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include/fmt/core.h:749:19: note: non-constexpr function 'on_error' cannot be used in a constant expression
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ErrorHandler::on_error(message);
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^
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include/fmt/format.h:2081:16: note: in call to '&checker.context_->on_error(&"argument index out of range"[0])'
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context_.on_error("argument index out of range");
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^
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{fmt} can be used as a safe portable replacement for ``itoa``
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(`godbolt <https://godbolt.org/g/NXmpU4>`_):
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.. code:: c++
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fmt::memory_buffer buf;
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format_to(buf, "{}", 42); // replaces itoa(42, buffer, 10)
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format_to(buf, "{:x}", 42); // replaces itoa(42, buffer, 16)
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// access the string using to_string(buf) or buf.data()
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An object of any user-defined type for which there is an overloaded
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:code:`std::ostream` insertion operator (``operator<<``) can be formatted:
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.. code:: c++
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#include "fmt/ostream.h"
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class Date {
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int year_, month_, day_;
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public:
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Date(int year, int month, int day) : year_(year), month_(month), day_(day) {}
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friend std::ostream &operator<<(std::ostream &os, const Date &d) {
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return os << d.year_ << '-' << d.month_ << '-' << d.day_;
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}
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};
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std::string s = fmt::format("The date is {}", Date(2012, 12, 9));
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// s == "The date is 2012-12-9"
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You can create your own functions similar to `format
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<http://fmtlib.net/latest/api.html#format>`_ and
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`print <http://fmtlib.net/latest/api.html#print>`_
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which take arbitrary arguments (`godbolt <https://godbolt.org/g/MHjHVf>`_):
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.. code:: c++
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// Prints formatted error message.
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void vreport_error(const char *format, fmt::format_args args) {
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fmt::print("Error: ");
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fmt::vprint(format, args);
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}
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template <typename... Args>
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void report_error(const char *format, const Args & ... args) {
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vreport_error(format, fmt::make_format_args(args...));
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}
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report_error("file not found: {}", path);
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Note that ``vreport_error`` is not parameterized on argument types which can
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improve compile times and reduce code size compared to fully parameterized version.
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Projects using this library
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---------------------------
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* `0 A.D. <http://play0ad.com/>`_: A free, open-source, cross-platform real-time strategy game
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* `AMPL/MP <https://github.com/ampl/mp>`_:
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An open-source library for mathematical programming
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* `AvioBook <https://www.aviobook.aero/en>`_: A comprehensive aircraft operations suite
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* `CUAUV <http://cuauv.org/>`_: Cornell University's autonomous underwater vehicle
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* `HarpyWar/pvpgn <https://github.com/pvpgn/pvpgn-server>`_:
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Player vs Player Gaming Network with tweaks
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* `KBEngine <http://kbengine.org/>`_: An open-source MMOG server engine
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* `Keypirinha <http://keypirinha.com/>`_: A semantic launcher for Windows
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* `Kodi <https://kodi.tv/>`_ (formerly xbmc): Home theater software
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* `Lifeline <https://github.com/peter-clark/lifeline>`_: A 2D game
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* `Drake <http://drake.mit.edu/>`_: A planning, control, and analysis toolbox
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for nonlinear dynamical systems (MIT)
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* `Envoy <https://lyft.github.io/envoy/>`_: C++ L7 proxy and communication bus
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(Lyft)
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* `FiveM <https://fivem.net/>`_: a modification framework for GTA V
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* `MongoDB Smasher <https://github.com/duckie/mongo_smasher>`_: A small tool to
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generate randomized datasets
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* `OpenSpace <http://openspaceproject.com/>`_: An open-source astrovisualization
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framework
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* `PenUltima Online (POL) <http://www.polserver.com/>`_:
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An MMO server, compatible with most Ultima Online clients
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* `quasardb <https://www.quasardb.net/>`_: A distributed, high-performance,
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associative database
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* `readpe <https://bitbucket.org/sys_dev/readpe>`_: Read Portable Executable
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* `redis-cerberus <https://github.com/HunanTV/redis-cerberus>`_: A Redis cluster proxy
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* `Saddy <https://github.com/mamontov-cpp/saddy-graphics-engine-2d>`_:
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Small crossplatform 2D graphic engine
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* `Salesforce Analytics Cloud <http://www.salesforce.com/analytics-cloud/overview/>`_:
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Business intelligence software
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* `Scylla <http://www.scylladb.com/>`_: A Cassandra-compatible NoSQL data store that can handle
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1 million transactions per second on a single server
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* `Seastar <http://www.seastar-project.org/>`_: An advanced, open-source C++ framework for
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high-performance server applications on modern hardware
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* `spdlog <https://github.com/gabime/spdlog>`_: Super fast C++ logging library
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* `Stellar <https://www.stellar.org/>`_: Financial platform
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* `Touch Surgery <https://www.touchsurgery.com/>`_: Surgery simulator
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* `TrinityCore <https://github.com/TrinityCore/TrinityCore>`_: Open-source MMORPG framework
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`More... <https://github.com/search?q=cppformat&type=Code>`_
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If you are aware of other projects using this library, please let me know
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by `email <mailto:victor.zverovich@gmail.com>`_ or by submitting an
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`issue <https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/issues>`_.
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Motivation
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----------
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So why yet another formatting library?
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There are plenty of methods for doing this task, from standard ones like
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the printf family of function and IOStreams to Boost Format library and
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FastFormat. The reason for creating a new library is that every existing
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solution that I found either had serious issues or didn't provide
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all the features I needed.
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Printf
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~~~~~~
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The good thing about printf is that it is pretty fast and readily available
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being a part of the C standard library. The main drawback is that it
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doesn't support user-defined types. Printf also has safety issues although
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they are mostly solved with `__attribute__ ((format (printf, ...))
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<http://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Function-Attributes.html>`_ in GCC.
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There is a POSIX extension that adds positional arguments required for
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`i18n <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internationalization_and_localization>`_
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to printf but it is not a part of C99 and may not be available on some
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platforms.
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IOStreams
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~~~~~~~~~
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The main issue with IOStreams is best illustrated with an example:
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.. code:: c++
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std::cout << std::setprecision(2) << std::fixed << 1.23456 << "\n";
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which is a lot of typing compared to printf:
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.. code:: c++
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printf("%.2f\n", 1.23456);
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Matthew Wilson, the author of FastFormat, referred to this situation with
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IOStreams as "chevron hell". IOStreams doesn't support positional arguments
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by design.
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The good part is that IOStreams supports user-defined types and is safe
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although error reporting is awkward.
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Boost Format library
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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This is a very powerful library which supports both printf-like format
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strings and positional arguments. The main its drawback is performance.
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According to various benchmarks it is much slower than other methods
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considered here. Boost Format also has excessive build times and severe
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code bloat issues (see `Benchmarks`_).
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FastFormat
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~~~~~~~~~~
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This is an interesting library which is fast, safe and has positional
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arguments. However it has significant limitations, citing its author:
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Three features that have no hope of being accommodated within the
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current design are:
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* Leading zeros (or any other non-space padding)
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* Octal/hexadecimal encoding
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* Runtime width/alignment specification
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It is also quite big and has a heavy dependency, STLSoft, which might be
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too restrictive for using it in some projects.
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Loki SafeFormat
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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SafeFormat is a formatting library which uses printf-like format strings
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and is type safe. It doesn't support user-defined types or positional
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arguments. It makes unconventional use of ``operator()`` for passing
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format arguments.
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Tinyformat
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~~~~~~~~~~
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This library supports printf-like format strings and is very small and
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fast. Unfortunately it doesn't support positional arguments and wrapping
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it in C++98 is somewhat difficult. Also its performance and code compactness
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are limited by IOStreams.
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Boost Spirit.Karma
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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This is not really a formatting library but I decided to include it here
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for completeness. As IOStreams it suffers from the problem of mixing
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verbatim text with arguments. The library is pretty fast, but slower
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on integer formatting than ``fmt::Writer`` on Karma's own benchmark,
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see `Fast integer to string conversion in C++
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<http://zverovich.net/2013/09/07/integer-to-string-conversion-in-cplusplus.html>`_.
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Benchmarks
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----------
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Speed tests
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~~~~~~~~~~~
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The following speed tests results were generated by building
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``tinyformat_test.cpp`` on Ubuntu GNU/Linux 14.04.1 with
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``g++-4.8.2 -O3 -DSPEED_TEST -DHAVE_FORMAT``, and taking the best of three
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runs. In the test, the format string ``"%0.10f:%04d:%+g:%s:%p:%c:%%\n"`` or
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equivalent is filled 2000000 times with output sent to ``/dev/null``; for
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further details see the `source
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/format-benchmark/blob/master/tinyformat_test.cpp>`_.
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================= ============= ===========
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Library Method Run Time, s
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================= ============= ===========
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libc printf 1.35
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libc++ std::ostream 3.42
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fmt 534bff7 fmt::print 1.56
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tinyformat 2.0.1 tfm::printf 3.73
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Boost Format 1.54 boost::format 8.44
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Folly Format folly::format 2.54
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================= ============= ===========
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As you can see ``boost::format`` is much slower than the alternative methods; this
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is confirmed by `other tests <http://accu.org/index.php/journals/1539>`_.
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Tinyformat is quite good coming close to IOStreams. Unfortunately tinyformat
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cannot be faster than the IOStreams because it uses them internally.
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Performance of fmt is close to that of printf, being `faster than printf on integer
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formatting <http://zverovich.net/2013/09/07/integer-to-string-conversion-in-cplusplus.html>`_,
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but slower on floating-point formatting which dominates this benchmark.
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Compile time and code bloat
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The script `bloat-test.py
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/format-benchmark/blob/master/bloat-test.py>`_
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from `format-benchmark <https://github.com/fmtlib/format-benchmark>`_
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tests compile time and code bloat for nontrivial projects.
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It generates 100 translation units and uses ``printf()`` or its alternative
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five times in each to simulate a medium sized project. The resulting
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executable size and compile time (Apple LLVM version 8.1.0 (clang-802.0.42),
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macOS Sierra, best of three) is shown in the following tables.
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**Optimized build (-O3)**
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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Method Compile Time, s Executable size, KiB Stripped size, KiB
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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printf 2.7 29 26
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printf+string 18.4 29 26
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IOStreams 34.6 59 55
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fmt 22.0 37 34
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tinyformat 51.8 103 97
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Boost Format 120.5 762 739
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Folly Format 158.7 102 87
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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As you can see, fmt has 60% less overhead in terms of resulting binary code
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size compared to IOStreams and comes pretty close to ``printf``. Boost Format
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has by far the largest overheads.
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``printf+string`` is the same as ``printf`` but with extra ``<string>``
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include to measure the overhead of the latter.
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**Non-optimized build**
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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Method Compile Time, s Executable size, KiB Stripped size, KiB
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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printf 2.4 33 30
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printf+string 18.5 33 30
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IOStreams 31.9 56 52
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fmt 20.9 56 51
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tinyformat 38.9 88 82
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Boost Format 64.8 366 304
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Folly Format 113.5 442 428
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============= =============== ==================== ==================
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``libc``, ``lib(std)c++`` and ``libfmt`` are all linked as shared
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libraries to compare formatting function overhead only. Boost Format
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and tinyformat are header-only libraries so they don't provide any
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linkage options.
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Running the tests
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Please refer to `Building the library`__ for the instructions on how to build
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the library and run the unit tests.
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__ http://fmtlib.net/latest/usage.html#building-the-library
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Benchmarks reside in a separate repository,
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`format-benchmarks <https://github.com/fmtlib/format-benchmark>`_,
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so to run the benchmarks you first need to clone this repository and
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generate Makefiles with CMake::
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$ git clone --recursive https://github.com/fmtlib/format-benchmark.git
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$ cd format-benchmark
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$ cmake .
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Then you can run the speed test::
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$ make speed-test
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or the bloat test::
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$ make bloat-test
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License
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-------
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fmt is distributed under the BSD `license
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<https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/blob/master/LICENSE.rst>`_.
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The `Format String Syntax
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<http://fmtlib.net/latest/syntax.html>`_
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section in the documentation is based on the one from Python `string module
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documentation <https://docs.python.org/3/library/string.html#module-string>`_
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adapted for the current library. For this reason the documentation is
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distributed under the Python Software Foundation license available in
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`doc/python-license.txt
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<https://raw.github.com/fmtlib/fmt/master/doc/python-license.txt>`_.
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It only applies if you distribute the documentation of fmt.
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Acknowledgments
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---------------
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The fmt library is maintained by Victor Zverovich (`vitaut
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<https://github.com/vitaut>`_) and Jonathan Müller (`foonathan
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<https://github.com/foonathan>`_) with contributions from many other people.
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See `Contributors <https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/graphs/contributors>`_ and
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`Releases <https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt/releases>`_ for some of the names.
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Let us know if your contribution is not listed or mentioned incorrectly and
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we'll make it right.
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The benchmark section of this readme file and the performance tests are taken
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from the excellent `tinyformat <https://github.com/c42f/tinyformat>`_ library
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written by Chris Foster. Boost Format library is acknowledged transitively
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since it had some influence on tinyformat.
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Some ideas used in the implementation are borrowed from `Loki
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<http://loki-lib.sourceforge.net/>`_ SafeFormat and `Diagnostic API
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<http://clang.llvm.org/doxygen/classclang_1_1Diagnostic.html>`_ in
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`Clang <http://clang.llvm.org/>`_.
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Format string syntax and the documentation are based on Python's `str.format
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<http://docs.python.org/2/library/stdtypes.html#str.format>`_.
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Thanks `Doug Turnbull <https://github.com/softwaredoug>`_ for his valuable
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comments and contribution to the design of the type-safe API and
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`Gregory Czajkowski <https://github.com/gcflymoto>`_ for implementing binary
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formatting. Thanks `Ruslan Baratov <https://github.com/ruslo>`_ for comprehensive
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`comparison of integer formatting algorithms <https://github.com/ruslo/int-dec-format-tests>`_
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and useful comments regarding performance, `Boris Kaul <https://github.com/localvoid>`_ for
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`C++ counting digits benchmark <https://github.com/localvoid/cxx-benchmark-count-digits>`_.
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Thanks to `CarterLi <https://github.com/CarterLi>`_ for contributing various
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improvements to the code.
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