| Home | Libraries | People | FAQ | More

### Lazy Operators

You can use the usual set of operators to form expressions. Examples:

    arg1 * arg1
    ref(x) = arg1 + ref(z)
    arg1 = arg2 + (3 * arg3)
    ref(x) = arg1[arg2] // assuming arg1 is indexable and arg2 is a valid index

Note the expression: `3 * arg3`. This expression is actually a short-hand equivalent to: `val(3) * arg3`. In most cases, like above, you can get away with it. But in some cases, you will have to explicitly wrap your values in `val`. Rules of thumb:

- In a binary expression (e.g. `3 * arg3`), at least one of the operands must be a phoenix primitive or expression.
- In a unary expression (e.g. `arg1++`), the single operand must be a phoenix primitive or expression.

If these basic rules are not followed, the result is either an error, or is immediately evaluated. Some examples:

    ref(x) = 123    // lazy
    x = 123         // immediate

    ref(x)[0]       // lazy
    x[0]            // immediate

    ref(x)[ref(i)]  // lazy
    ref(x)[i]       // lazy (equivalent to ref(x)[val(i)])
    x[ref(i)]       // illegal (x is not a phoenix primitive or expression)
    ref(x[ref(i)])  // illegal (x is not a phoenix primitive or expression)

##### First Practical Example

We've covered enough ground to present a real world example. We want to find the first odd number in an STL container. Normally we use a functor (function object) or a function pointer and pass that in to STL's `find_if` generic function:

Write a function:

    bool
    is_odd(int arg1)
    {
        return arg1 % 2 == 1;
    }

Pass a pointer to the function to STL's `find_if` algorithm:

    std::find_if(c.begin(), c.end(), &is_odd)

Using Phoenix, the same can be achieved directly with a one-liner:

    std::find_if(c.begin(), c.end(), arg1 % 2 == 1)

The expression `arg1 % 2 == 1` automagically creates a functor with the expected behavior. In FP, this unnamed function is called a lambda function. Unlike the function pointer version, which is monomorphic (expects and works only with a fixed type int argument), the Phoenix version is fully polymorphic and works with any container (of ints, of longs, of bignum, etc.) as long as its elements can handle the `arg1 % 2 == 1` expression.

(See find_if.cpp)