Shared variable among classes c++ - c++

Question

I have multiple classes that need to share a single instance of another class. Publicly it should be unknown that this class exists. Is it appropriate to do something like the following? (Was tested as written)
#include <iostream>
class hideme
{
private:
int a;
public:
void set(int b) { a = b; }
void add(int b) { a += b; }
int get() { return a; }
hideme() : a(0) { }
};
class HiddenWrapper
{
protected:
static hideme A;
};
hideme HiddenWrapper::A;
class addOne : public HiddenWrapper
{
public:
void add() { A.add(1); }
int get() { return A.get(); }
};
class addTwo : public HiddenWrapper
{
public:
void add() { A.add(2); }
int get() { return A.get(); }
};
int main()
{
addOne a;
addTwo b;
std::cout << "Initialized: " << a.get() << std::endl;
a.add();
std::cout << "Added one: " << a.get() << std::endl;
b.add();
std::cout << "Added two: " << b.get() << std::endl;
return 0;
}
For what it's worth, hideme is part of a library I'm attempting to design a facade around, and the other classes have members from the library that interact with the static hideme.
Additionally, if the header file written for HiddenWrapper has no corresponding source file, is that the best place to define its static member? With an include guard.
Is there any other method to solve this problem? As far as I could imagine (not terribly far) I could only solve it otherwise with friendship, which I am wary of.

Answer 1

You can prevent access to a class by not making it accessible outside the translation unit that uses it.
// public_header.h
class A {
void bar();
};
class B {
void foo();
}
// private_implementation.cpp
#include "public_header.h"
namespace {
class hidden { void baz() {} };
hidden h;
}
void A::bar() {
h.baz();
}
void B::foo() {
h.baz();
}
This class will be usable only by A::bar and B::foo. The type hidden and the variable h still technically have external linkage, but no other translation unit can say their names.

Answer 2

Sometimes it is a better idea to inject shared ressources (by reference or pointer) through the constructor (also known as composition instead of inheritance). This way gives you the ability to share or not (e.g. to have a thread-safe variant of your code which is not). See http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inversion_of_Control principle for more info.

Answer 3

This implements a singleton around some other class and hides it from
users:
class hideme {};
// fwd declarations
class x;
// library internal
class S
{
S() = delete;
S(S const&) = delete;
void operator=(S const&) = delete;
private:
static hideme& getInstance()
{
static hideme instance;
return instance;
}
friend x;
};
// library classes
class x {
hideme& s;
public:
x() : s(S::getInstance()) {}
};
int main()
{
x x;
return 0;
}
This does not handle cases where you actually want the hideme
instance to be destroyed when no other object is using it anymore. For
that you need to get a little bit more inventive using reference
counting.
I also should say that I think this is a bad idea. Singletons almost
always are.

Answer 4

Generally, the best approach, if you have a variable in the main part, and want to share it with all classes.
For example, if class X makes a change on this var, the change happened to the var in the main as well: you can use EXTEND
************************ The main *********************
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;
#include "Game.hpp"
//0: not specified yet; 1:singlemode; 2:multiplayerMode
int playingMode = 0;
int main()
{
Game game;
game.Run();
std::cout<< playingMode << std::endl;
return 0;
}
*********************** Class X *****************
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;
extern int playingMode;
....
....
if(m_isSinglePressed)
{
playingMode = 1;
...
}
else if(m_isMultiPressed)
{
playingMode = 2;
...
}