how to get char pointer from ostringstream without a copy in c++ - c++

Question

I have a ostringstream variable which contains some data.
I want to get set a char * pointer to the data inside the ostringstream.
If I do the following:
std::ostringstream ofs;
.....
const char *stam = (ofs.str()).c_str();
There is a copy of the content of the string in ofs.
I want to get a pointer to that content without a copy.
Is there a way to do so?

Answer 1

This actually answers the question... took a while but I wanted to do it for the same reasons (efficiency vs portability is fine for my situation):
class mybuf : public std::stringbuf {
public:
// expose the terribly named end/begin pointers
char *eback() {
return std::streambuf::eback();
}
char *pptr() {
return std::streambuf::pptr();
}
};
class myos : public std::ostringstream {
mybuf d_buf;
public:
myos() {
// replace buffer
std::basic_ostream<char>::rdbuf(&d_buf);
}
char *ptr();
};
char *myos::ptr() {
// assert contiguous
assert ( tellp() == (d_buf.pptr()-d_buf.eback()) );
return d_buf.eback();
}
int main() {
myos os;
os << "hello";
std::cout << "size: " << os.tellp() << std::endl;
std::string dat(os.ptr(),os.tellp());
std::cout << "data: " << dat << std::endl;
}
This points to, yet again, the deeper, underlying problem with the standard library - a confusion between contracts and "safety". When writing a messaging service, I need a library with efficient contracts... not safety. Other times, when writing a UI, I want strong safety - and cares less about efficiency.

Answer 2

Although you can't get a pointer to the character buffer in the ostringstream, you can get access to its characters without copying them if you switch to using stringstream. A stringstream allows input and output (reading from and writing to the stream), whereas ostringstream allows only output (writing to the stream). Example:
std::stringstream ss;
ss << "This is a test.";
// Read stringstream from index 0. Use different values to look at any character index.
ss.seekg(0);
char ch;
while (ss.get(ch)) { // loop getting single characters
std::cout << ch;
}
ss.clear(); // Clear eof bit in case you want to read more from ss
This site has a pretty good overview of stringstreams and what you can do with them.