c++ Modify drivers, got "cannot convert from overloaded function" error - c++

Question

Im modifiy my display drivers to get update notifcation sent from the USB port. So far so good, but i got stock on follow:
GPEFlat::GPEFlat()
{
PBOOT_ARGS args;
ULONG fbSize;
ULONG fbOffset;
ULONG offsetX;
ULONG offsetY;
BOOL bFoundArgs = FALSE;
BOOL m_MouseDisabled = TRUE;
HANDLE m_hAttachEvent = CreateEvent(NULL, FALSE, FALSE, L"MouseAttached");
HANDLE m_hDetachEvent = CreateEvent(NULL, FALSE, FALSE, L"MouseDetached");
HANDLE m_hCursorThread = CreateThread(NULL, 0, (LPTHREAD_START_ROUTINE)MouseEventThread, NULL, 0, NULL);
DWORD
GPEFlat::MouseEventThread(void)
{
DWORD rc = TRUE;
HANDLE handles[2];
handles[0] = m_hAttachEvent;
handles[1] = m_hDetachEvent;
The resulting error is:
Error 1 error C2440: 'type cast' : cannot convert from 'overloaded-function' to 'LPTHREAD_START_ROUTINE' drivers\display\vgaflat
So the line : HANDLE m_hCursorThread = CreateThread(NULL, 0, (LPTHREAD_START_ROUTINE)MouseEventThread, NULL, 0, NULL);
Dosnt work. Got some pointers that it may be to non static method.
How should i do this?
Greetings

Answer 1

The thing to understand is that functions (including static methods) and non-static methods are different things. CreateEvent expects a function. You must give it that, it will not work with GPEFlat::MouseEventThread because that's a method. What you can do though is give it a function which calls GPEFlat::MouseEventThread. Usually this is done like this
DWORD WINAPI thread_starter(LPVOID that)
{
return ((GPEFlat*)that)->MouseEventThread();
}
...
CreateThread(NULL, 0, thread_starter, this, 0, NULL);
Note that I pass this to CreateThread, that's very important. CreateThread passes it to the parameter that in thread_starter, which uses that to call the method you wanted to call all along.

Answer 2

The MouseEventThread have to be a static function, because a function pointer is not the same as a member function pointer. Static methods can be used as normal function pointers, but non-static member functions can not.
If you need to reference class members, then one very simple solution is to have a static wrapper functions, which takes the instance of the object (this in the constructor) and then calls the actual member function using that instance pointer.
Something like
class GPEFlat
{
// ...
private:
static DWORD MouseEventThreadWrapper(LPVOID instance)
{ return reinterpret_cast<GPEFlat*>(instance)->MouseEventThread(); }
// ...
};
Create the thread with this wrapper function instead, passing this as argument to it:
GPEFlat::GPEFlat()
{
// ...
HANDLE m_hCursorThread = CreateThread(
NULL, 0, (LPTHREAD_START_ROUTINE)MouseEventThreadWrapper, this, 0, NULL);
}