DEV Community: hacking C++

Useful Command Line Tools in 2023

hacking C++ — Wed, 27 Jul 2022 12:11:00 +0000

These are some of the tools that have made my life in the terminal so much easier over the last years. Also, all of them work inside WSL2 without any hassle.

My other lists:

nnn

A super fast, fully-featured terminal file manager with a minimalistic interface and less/VIM-like keybindings (navigation with hjkl, search with /,...). Also offers some useful plugins like instant preview, "open with", "go to git main directory", etc. Can also be used as quick file system navigator (can change to last active dir on exit).
As an alternative to the usually pretty outdated versions in OS packages you can just donwload one of the statically linked executables on the GitHub release page.

broot

Fast file browser and manager that displays a tree that is automatically partially collapsed so it fits the terminal height. By default the primary mode of navigation is a super-fast search, but one can also switch to a VIM-like modal interface. Broot offers working with multiple panes and a staging area for operations on multiple files. The instant preview pane can also diplay images right out of the box.
Broot runs on Linux, Android, Windows 10+ and OSX. Binaries can be downloaded from here.

cargo install --locked --path .
pkgin install broot 
emerge broot
apk install broot
port install broot

exa

An improved file lister with more features and better defaults. It uses colors to distinguish file types and metadata. It knows about symlinks, extended attributes, and Git. And it's small, fast, and just one single binary.

apt install exa 
dnf install exa
emerge sys-apps/exa
nix-env -i exa
pacman -S exa
zypper install exa
brew install exa

ncdu

A disk usage analyzer with an ncurses interface. It is designed to find space hogs on a remote server where you don't have an entire graphical setup available, but it is a useful tool even on regular desktop systems.
Packages are available for almost all operating systems.

apt install ncdu

duf

disk usage/free utility

apt install duf
nix-env -iA nixpkgs.duf
pacman -S duf
pkg install duf
pkg_add duf
xbps-install -S duf
brew install duf
choco install duf
scoop install duf

fasd

A command-line productivity booster. Fasd offers quick access to files and directories for POSIX shells. It is inspired by tools like autojump, z and v. Fasd keeps track of files and directories you have accessed, so that you can quickly reference them in the command line.

apt install fasd
dnf install fasd
pacman -S fasd
brew install fasd

fd

A simple, fast and user-friendly alternative to find.

apt install fd-find

ripgrep

A line-oriented search tool that recursively searches the current directory for a regex pattern. Orders of magnitude faster than grep. By default, ripgrep will respect gitignore rules and automatically skip hidden files/directories and binary files.

apt install ripgrep
dnf install ripgrep
emerge sys-apps/ripgrep
pacman -S ripgrep
pkg install ripgrep
brew install ripgrep
choco install ripgrep
scoop install ripgrep

fzf

A general-purpose command-line fuzzy finder. It's an interactive Unix filter for the command-line that can be used with any list; files, command history, processes, hostnames, bookmarks, git commits, etc.

apt install fzf
apk add fzf
dnf install fzf
nix-env -iA nixpkgs.fzf
pacman -S fzf
pkg install fzf
pkg_add fzf
pkgin install fzf
xbps-install -S fzf
zypper install fzf
brew install fzf
choco install fzf
scoop install fzf
conda install -c conda-forge fzf

f2

A cross-platform command-line batch renaming tool. By default it does a "dry run" and previews the replacement. It supports regex, string case operations, indexing, special placeholder variables for path / dates / EXIF fields / Exiftool fields / ID3 fields and much more. It can even undo the last batch operation.

go install github.com/ayoisaiah/f2/cmd/f2@latest

peco

Simplistic interactive tool for on-the-fly filtering. Useful for filtering stuff like logs, process stats.

apt install peco
pacman -S peco
brew install peco
choco install peco

bat

A 'cat' clone with syntax highlighting and Git integration.

apt install bat
apk add bat
pacman -S bat
dnf install bat
emerge sys-apps/bat
pkg install bat
pkg_add bat
nix-env -i bat
zypper install bat
port install bat
choco install bat
scoop install bat

multitail

Lets you view one or multiple files like 'tail'. The difference is that it creates multiple windows on your console (with ncurses). It can also monitor wildcards: if another file matching the wildcard has a more recent modification date, it will automatically switch to that file.

apt install multitail
brew install multitail

colortail

Works like 'tail' but can optionally read one or more config files where it's specified which patterns results in which colors. Colortail uses regular expressions to determine which lines and parts of lines to print in which colors.

apt install colortail
brew install colortail

colordiff

A wrapper for 'diff' that produces the same output but with pretty syntax highlighting. Colour schemes can be customized.

apt install colordiff
brew install colordiff

tmux

A terminal multiplexer. It lets you switch easily between several programs in one terminal, detach them (they keep running in the background) and reattach them to a different terminal.

apt install tmux 
dnf install tmux
pacman -S tmux
port install tmux
yum install tmux
zypper install tmux
brew install tmux

tldr

The tldr pages are a community effort to simplify the beloved man pages with practical examples. Support for multiple languages.

apt install tldr 
npm install -g tldr

The Fuck

Corrects errors in previous console commands.

pip install thefuck

tig

An ncurses-based text-mode interface for git. It functions mainly as a Git repository browser, but can also assist in staging changes for commit at chunk level and act as a pager for output from various Git commands.

apt install tig
nix-env -i tig
pkg install tig
brew install tig
tig is part of [git for windows](https://gitforwindows.org/)

cgdb

A lightweight curses (terminal-based) interface to GDB. It provides a split screen view that displays the source code as it executes. The keyboard interface is modeled after VIM.

apt install cgdb

hyperfine

Benchmarking of executables similar to the classic 'time' command but much more sophisticated.

statistical analysis across multiple runs
supports arbitrary shell commands
constant feedback
warmup run
cache-clearing commands
statistical outlier detection
export results to various formats
parameterized benchmarks
cross-platform

Ubuntu: 
  wget https://github.com/sharkdp/hyperfine/releases/download/v1.14.0/hyperfine_1.14.0_amd64.deb
  sudo dpkg -i hyperfine_1.14.0_amd64.deb
Other:
  dnf install hyperfine 
  pacman -S hyperfine 
  apk add hyperfine 
  nix-env -i hyperfine 
  brew install hyperfine

nvtop

htop-like performance monitor for GPUs
Works for GPUs from

NVIDIA (Kepler and newer)
AMD (requires kernel >= 5.14)
Intel (requires kernel >= 5.19)

  apt install nvtop
  pacman -S nvtop

bitwise

A multi base calculator supporting dynamic base conversion and bit manipulation. Also offers an interactive mode navigation. A handy tool for low level hackers.

apt install bitwise
snap install bitwise 
zypper install bitwise 
brew install bitwise 
port install bitwise

fx

JSON viewer with less/VIM-like key mappings and mouse support.
Nice for browsing large JSON documents; key navigation, (recursive)
folding/unfolding, searching, etc.

pkg install fx
snap install fx
brew install fx
scoop install fx

jq

A lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor.

apt install jq
dnf install jq
pacman -S jq
pkg install jq
pkgutil -i jq
zypper install jq
brew install jq
port install jq
chocolatey install jq

yq

A lightweight and portable command-line YAML, JSON and XML processor. yq uses jq like syntax but works with yaml files as well as json and xml. It doesn't yet support everything jq does - but it does support the most common operations and functions, and more is being added continuously.

snap install fx
brew install fx

pandoc

Tool to convert between markup formats. Supports docx, epub, fb2, jira, latex, markdown, man, muse, odt, org, rtf, textile, asciidoc, html and more.

apt install pandoc
dnf install pandoc 
pacman -S pandoc
brew install pandoc 
choco install pandoc
winget install pandoc

aiksaurus

A command-line thesaurus (English only).

apt install aiksaurus

grip

Previews GitHub flavored markdown files using GitHub's API. The styles and rendering come directly from GitHub, so you'll know exactly how it will appear. Changes you make to the file will be instantly reflected in the browser without requiring a page refresh.

brew install grip 
pip install grip

pdf2svg

A simple PDF to SVG converter using the Poppler and Cairo libraries.

apt install pdf2svg
yum install pdf2svg

Windows Binaries

imagemagick

Tool to create, edit, compose, or convert digital images. It can read and write images in a variety of formats (over 200) including PNG, JPEG, GIF, WebP, HEIC, SVG, PDF, DPX, EXR and TIFF. ImageMagick can resize, flip, mirror, rotate, distort, shear and transform images, adjust image colors, apply various special effects, or draw text, lines, polygons, ellipses and Bézier curves.

apt install imagemagick
brew install imagemagick

Download Page

pastel

A tool to generate, analyze, convert and manipulate colors. It supports many different color formats and color spaces like RGB (sRGB), HSL, CIELAB, CIELCh as well as ANSI 8-bit and 24-bit representations.

apt install pastel
pacman -S pastel 
brew install pastel 
scoop install pastel

deadlink

Parses text files for HTTP URLs and checks if they are still valid.

pip install deadlink

asciinema

Lets you record terminal sessions and replay them in a terminal as well as in a web browser.

apt install asciinema
brew install asciinema 
pip install asciinema

epy

A command line ebook reader. A fork of epr with more features: progress percentage, bookmarks, dictionary integration, bold/italic formatting. Supported formats: Epub, FictionBook (fb2), Mobi, AZW3.

pip3 install epy

Binary Representations of Numeric Values

hacking C++ — Sun, 24 Jul 2022 11:09:53 +0000

The following cheat sheet shows the most common representations of integers, unsigned integers and floating point values used by most hardware platforms and programming languages.
Check out this tool for visualizing and experimenting with IEEE floating point bit representations.

The Situation in C++

`std::numeric_limits<Type>`

provides numeric properties for all of C++'s fundamental types (int, float, double, unsigned int, etc.). The cheat sheet below shows how the return value of std::numeric_limits<Type>::member_function() relate to the binary representation of numeric values for Type.

Using `numeric_limits`

#include <limits>
// smallest negative value:
std::cout << std::numeric_limits<double>::lowest();

// float/double: smallest value > 0
// integers: smallest value
std::cout << std::numeric_limits<double>::min();

// largest positive value:
std::cout << std::numeric_limits<double>::max();

// smallest difference btw. 1 and next value:
std::cout << std::numeric_limits<double>::epsilon();

Bitwise Operations in C++

Some examples for manipulating the bits of unsigned integers

#include <cstdint>
                             // value | memory bits
std::uint8_t a = 6;          //       | 0000 0110
std::uint8_t b = 0b00001011; //       | 0000 1011
std::uint8_t c1 = (a & b);   // 2     | 0000 0010
std::uint8_t c2 = (a | b);   // 15    | 0000 1111
std::uint8_t c3 = (a ^ b);   // 13    | 0000 1101
std::uint8_t c4 = ~a;        // 249   | 1111 1001
std::uint8_t c5 = ~b;        // 244   | 1111 0100       

// test if int is even/odd:  // result:
bool a_odd  = a & 1;         // 0 => false
bool a_even = !(a & 1);      // 1 => true

#include <cstdint>
                             //     | memory bits
std::uint8_t a = 1;          //     | 0000 0001
a <<= 6;  // 64              //     | 0100 0000
a >>= 4;  // 4               //     | 0000 0100

std::uint8_t b1 = (1 << 1);  // 2   | 0000 0010
std::uint8_t b2 = (1 << 2);  // 4   | 0000 0100
std::uint8_t b3 = (1 << 4);  // 16  | 0001 0000

Type Widths / Memory Sizes of Fundamental Types

For more cool cheat sheets see my collection of C++ cheat sheets.

Fantastic (and lesser known) VIM Plugins in 2023

hacking C++ — Sat, 23 Jul 2022 22:42:00 +0000

You won't find the "NERDTree", "ALE", "surround-vim" and all the other big names on this list - there's already a gazillion of VIM plugin lists with those around.
While some of the following plugins might not have thousands of stars on Github they are nevertheless absolute gems and have been reliable and invaluable daily companions of mine.

My other lists:

Quickfix Reflector

Super intuitive mass-editing within hundreds of files using VIM's quickfix list.

use grep or any other method to populate the quickfix list with file locations
edit quickfix entries with all VIM tools (change, substitute, ...)
or remove quickfix lines of files that you don't want to be affected by changes
apply all changes to the actual target locations simply by saving the quickfix list
do more edits, saves, ...

Traces

Live highlight of patterns and range commands (substitute, global, …). Super useful when crafting complex regex searches and/or replacements.

Poppy

Highlights different levels of matching delimiters (parentheses, braces, …) in different colors.

Cursorword

Underlines all occurrences of the word under the cursor. Super fast and useful for spotting variable occurrences or spelling errors in code and redundancy in prose.

vim-visual-multi

Multiple Cursors for VIM. For the occasions when VIM's gn motion isn't powerful enough or you need more visual feedback.
Very nice plugin! Substantially faster, less buggy, better visual feedback and a lot more features than the old vim-multiple-cursors plugin. Actually the first incarnation of multiple cursors in VIM that I actually like and use every day.

Highlighted Yank

Flashes the text range that is selected by a yank command like yip. Speed and color can be configured.

vim-clap

Generic finder and dispatcher like vim-fzf. Lets you fuzzy find files, commands, help topics, etc. Still very young, but seems very promising and works smoothly. You should use it together with the insanely fast ripgrep (instead of grep) as file system crawler. I found it to be faster and more convenient than vim-fzf and also easier to extend.

Vista

Provides a window for viewing and searching LSP symbols and/or tags. Similar, but faster and more feature rich than the classic tagbar plugin. Works really well with LSP clients like ALE and integrates with vim-clap.

asynctasks.vim

Lets you manage and excute tasks asynchronously (build, clean, run, ...) based on simple task files. It’s also super easy to define different profiles for release, build, Linux, Windows, etc.

SHSwitch

Switch between C or C++ header and source file. Much better and more lightweight than the old 'a.vim' plugin.

NeoDebug

Debug with gdb/pdb/lldb in VIM. Shows current instruction and breakpoints in code; windows for debugger console, locals, registers, stacks, threads, breakpoints, disassembly, watch expressions. Similar to, but more user friendly and feature-rich than VIM's termdebug package. I found that it just works without any setup hassle.

EasyAlign

Align text into columns; lots of neat options.

Replace With Register

Replace a motion/text object with the contents of the default register without changing the register content.
Tip: In Vim 9 you can use upper case P in visual mode to paste without affecting registers.

Cycle

Augments VIM’s built-in increment/decrement feature (<C-a>/<C-x>) so that you can also toggle between pairs of words or cycle through lists of related words like true/false, yes/no, weekdays, months, etc. You can also add your own word lists.

Surround-Funk

Commands & text objects for changing/deleting/yanking surrounding function names or function calls (name + arguments in parentheses).
You should make sure that the mappings don't interfere with the classic Surround plugin (esp. ys). You can simply deactivate the defaults and define mappings in the vimrc (just copy them from the readme and adapt them to your liking).

Angry Text Object

Text objects for comma-separated regions; e.g., in function parameter lists.

CamelCaseMotion

Motions based on sub-words in CamelCase, snake_case, dash-case, etc.

Variable Segment Text Object

Text objects that select sub-words in CamelCase, snake_case, dash-case, etc.

Indent Text Object

Text objects based on the current indent level. Great for indentation-based languages or markup (Python, HAML, etc.)

Word Column Text Object

Text object for selecting whitespace-separated columns. Useful for working with tab-separated data.

After Text Object

Provides a text object to select text after designated characters. Example: ca= for changing after =

Line Text Object

Provides a text object for selecting the content of the current line (without the whitespace before and after).

Whitespace Text Object

Provides a text object for quickly deleting/selecting contiguous regions of whitespace.

#ifdef Text Object

Text objects i#/a# (alternative i3/a3) for C preprocessor regions delimited by #ifdef, #ifndef, #else, #elif, #endif, etc.;
unfortunately not well documented, but it works flawlessly.

UndoTree

Shows a per-file undo tree and let's you navigate it (switch between revisions).

CssColor

Live preview of colors for constants like red, #ffa, rgb(0,0,255), etc.

Signature

Shows marks in the sign column. Lets you also define additional markers with m1, m2, etc. that can be on multiple lines at the same time (great for tagging lines that belong to one "topic").

nnn.vim

Integration of the excellent command line file explorer nnn into vim. Offers commands for file picking and a file explorer window. Substantially faster than NERD Tree and a no-brainer if you already use nnn (which you should).

File Renamer

Lets you (mass) rename files in a directory using vim editing commands. Can be quite useful and way faster and a lot more usable than other renaming tools or shell scripts.

AM Colors

amdark

My personal color scheme(s). Dark scheme, light scheme and hight-contrast light scheme for presentations.

amlight

ampresent - High Contrast Light Scheme

Vimcolorschemes

An aggregator site that lists colorschemes from GitHub. Shows preview images and let's you browse schemes by category (light, dark), recently updated, trending, top, etc.

Great Coding Fonts in 2023

hacking C++ — Sat, 23 Jul 2022 19:59:00 +0000

Monospace fonts for coding with a distinct "0".

My other lists:

JetBrains Mono

A great font that also supports ligatures.
Homepage / Specimen Page

Liberation Mono

Download1 / Download2

Cascadia Code

My personal choice, also with coding ligature support.
It comes bundled with the new Windows Terminal.
Repository / Info Page

Hack

Homepage / Repository

Cousine

Download / Google Fonts

Fira Code

Repository / Fira Font Family Repo

Consolas

Bundled with Windows 10/11
My previous font of choice (before I switched to Cascadia) and still one of my favorites.
Homepage

JuliaMono

Repository

Source Code Pro

Repository / Adobe Fonts on GitHub

Input Mono

Homepage

Camingo Code

Download

IBM Plex Mono

Google Fonts Page

Iosevka

Repository

Sometype Mono

Download

More...

Here is my list of over 80 monospace coding fonts for coding

std::string C++20/23 Interface Novelties

hacking C++ — Sat, 02 Jul 2022 16:27:14 +0000

Here's a small cheat sheet for 4 new member functions of std::string.

More Cheat Sheets

Benefits

resize_and_overwrite avoids costly initialization of a string's memory buffer if you need to immediatly overwrite it with characters coming from e.g., a call to a C API.

// BEFORE:
std::string s1;
s1.resize(1024);  // costly initialization
// write characters to string:
size_t sizeWritten = some_C_library(s1.data(), s1.size());

// AFTER:
std::string s2;
s2.resize_and_overwrite(1024, [](char* p, size_t n){
  size_t sizeWritten = some_C_library(p, n);
  return sizeWritten;
});

Function Signatures and Overloads

namespace std {
template <typename CharT, typename Traits, typename Allocator>
class basic_string {
  // ...
  bool contains (std::basic_string_view<CharT>);
  bool contains (CharT);
  bool contains (CharT const*);

  bool starts_with (std::basic_string_view<CharT>);
  bool starts_with (CharT);
  bool starts_with (CharT const*);

  bool ends_with (std::basic_string_view<CharT>); 
  bool ends_with (CharT); 
  bool ends_with (CharT const*);

  template <typename Operation>
  constexpr void resize_and_overwrite (size_type count, Operation op);
  // ...
};
}  // std

C++ {fmt} Library Overview & Cheat Sheets

hacking C++ — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 12:34:40 +0000

{fmt} is a fast(er) and safe(r) alternative to C stdio (printf,...) and C++ iostreams (std::cout,...) that uses a Pythonesque format string syntax and is the origin and inspiration of C++20's std::format and C++23's upcoming std::print.

This article on hackingcpp.com offers a comprehensive and accessible overview of {fmt} with lots of runnable examples and visual aids:

how to set it up
quick overview of its interface and capabilities
hierarchical, task-oriented "how-to print/format X" sections
how to print custom types
cheat sheets as quick reference for format specifications

An Organized List of Over 700 Educational C++ Videos

hacking C++ — Sat, 09 Apr 2022 15:45:19 +0000

I've recently started a list of educational C++ videos like conference talks by world-renowned experts, video tutorials, and other explanatory videos related to C++.

The list currently contains links to over 700 videos including almost all episodes of Jason Turner's "C++ Weekly" series.

All videos are hierarchically organized by topic (using foldable sections) but one can also use the alphabetic index to quickly find a section by keyword.

This is only the first version, there's already more than 300 additional videos in the queue and I also might add a "search by tag" feature in the future.

A Growing Collection of C++ Cheat Sheets

hacking C++ — Sun, 09 Jan 2022 16:46:58 +0000

Anyone that has ever learned or is currently learning C++ knows the feeling of being overwhelmed by this beast of a programming language that is as complex as it is powerful.

To help learners along their journey I've created a collection of C++ cheat sheets that can be used to get a quick overview of a topic or to recap something one has already learned.

Currently, there are graphical visualizations of the standard library algorithms (including the ones from C++20), interface overview sheets for containers, sequence views, and various others.

Here are a few examples:

To see more cheat sheets visit https://hackingcpp.com/cpp/cheat_sheets.html

Follow me on Twitter @hackingcpp if you want to get notified of new cheat sheets.

DEV Community: hacking C++

Useful Command Line Tools in 2023

Binary Representations of Numeric Values

The Situation in C++

std::numeric_limits<Type>

Using numeric_limits

Bitwise Operations in C++

Some examples for manipulating the bits of unsigned integers

Type Widths / Memory Sizes of Fundamental Types

Fantastic (and lesser known) VIM Plugins in 2023

amdark

amlight

ampresent - High Contrast Light Scheme

Great Coding Fonts in 2023

JetBrains Mono

Liberation Mono

Cascadia Code

Hack

Cousine

Fira Code

Consolas

JuliaMono

Source Code Pro

Input Mono

Camingo Code

IBM Plex Mono

Iosevka

Sometype Mono

More...

std::string C++20/23 Interface Novelties

Benefits

Function Signatures and Overloads

C++ {fmt} Library Overview & Cheat Sheets

An Organized List of Over 700 Educational C++ Videos

A Growing Collection of C++ Cheat Sheets

`std::numeric_limits<Type>`

Using `numeric_limits`