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String to integer conversion library

This is a header-only library for converting a string containing a base-10 number into an integer value of a configurable type T.

The library offers functions to parse a string into an integer with validation of the input string or without validation. It is up to the embedder to pick the appropriate function.

If the validating functions are used, the input string is considered valid only if it consists of the digits '0' to '9'. An optional '+' or '-' sign is allowed at the very beginning of the input string too. If any other character is found, the input is considered invalid. The input string does not need to be null-terminated.

If the parsed number value would be less or greater than what the number type T can store without truncation, the input is considered invalid and parsing is stopped.

The non-validating functions do not validate the input string for validity nor do they check for overflow or underflow of the result value.

The library makes a few assumptions about the input in order to provide good performance:

  • all input is treated as base-10 numbers - no support for hexadecimal or octal numbers nor for floating point values
  • the library functions are optimized for valid input, i.e. strings that contain only the digits '0' to '9' (with an optional '+' or '-' sign in front). This is also true for the validating functions
  • the library will not handle leading whitespace in the input string. input strings with leading or trailing whitespace are simply considered invalid. The same is true for input strings containing non-integer numbers
  • the library functions will not modify errno in any way, nor will they throw any exceptions
  • the library functions will not allocate any memory on the heap

In contrast to other common string-to-integer functions, the functions of this library do not require null-terminated input strings. An input string is delimited simply by a start pointer (char const* p) and an end pointer (char const* e) into its data. All library functions guarantee to only read memory between p (inclusive) and e (exclusive).

Use cases

This library's string-to-integer conversion functionality is not as flexible as the one provided by other string-to-integer functions, e.g. std::stoull from the standard library or std::strtoull.

This library sacrifices some of the generality for performance. It is also optimized for valid input strings, and provides special functions that do not validate the input at all. Embedders can use these functions when they know the input strings are valid and will not overflow the target datatype.

Example usage

#include "jsteemann/atoi.h"
#include <iostream>

// the string to be parsed
std::string value("12345678901234");

bool valid;
auto result = jsteemann::atoi<uint64_t>(value.data(), value.data() + value.size(), valid);

if (valid) {
  // parsing succeeded!
  std::cout << "successfully parsed '" << value << "' into number " << result << std::endl;
} else {
  // parsing failed!
  std::cout << "failed to parse '" << value << "' into a number!" << std::endl;
}

The library contains the following validating functions:

// function to convert the string value between p 
// (inclusive) and e (exclusive) into a number value of type T
//
// the input string will always be interpreted as a base-10 number.
// expects the input string to contain only the digits '0' to '9'. an
// optional '+' or '-' sign is allowed too. 
// if any other character is found, the output parameter "valid" will 
// be set to false. if the parsed value is less or greater than what 
// type T can store without truncation, "valid" will also be set to 
// false. In this case the returned result should not be used.
// this function will not modify errno.
template<typename T>
static inline T atoi(char const* p, char const* e, bool& valid) noexcept;

// low-level worker function to convert the string value between p 
// (inclusive) and e (exclusive) into a positive number value of type T
//
// the input string will always be interpreted as a base-10 number.
// expects the input string to contain only the digits '0' to '9'. 
// if any other character is found, the output parameter "valid" will 
// be set to false. if the parsed value is greater than what type T can
// store without truncation, "valid" will also be set to false. In this
// case the returned result should not be used.
// this function will not modify errno.
template<typename T>
static inline T atoi_positive(char const* p, char const* e, bool& valid) noexcept;

The library contains the following non-validating functions:

// function to convert the string value between p 
// (inclusive) and e (exclusive) into a number value of type T, without
// validation of the input string - use this only for trusted input!
//
// the input string will always be interpreted as a base-10 number.
// expects the input string to contain only the digits '0' to '9'. an
// optional '+' or '-' sign is allowed too. 
// there is no validation of the input string, and overflow or underflow
// of the result value will not be detected.
// this function will not modify errno.
template<typename T>
inline T atoi_unchecked(char const* p, char const* e) noexcept;

// low-level worker function to convert the string value between p 
// (inclusive) and e (exclusive) into a positive number value of type T,
// without validation of the input string - use this only for trusted input!
//
// the input string will always be interpreted as a base-10 number.
// expects the input string to contain only the digits '0' to '9'. 
// there is no validation of the input string, and overflow or underflow
// of the result value will not be detected.
// this function will not modify errno.
template<typename T>
inline T atoi_positive_unchecked(char const* p, char const* e) noexcept;

Benchmark

To compare the performance of this library and the standard library's std::stoull and std::strtoull functions, there is a benchmark executable included.

It can be built and run as follows:

mkdir -p build
# be sure to build in Release mode here for compiler optimizations
(cd build && cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ..)
build/benchmark/bench

Benchmark results from local laptop (Linux x86-64):

500000000 iterations of std::stoull, string '7' took 4792 ms
500000000 iterations of std::strtoull, string '7' took 4482 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi, string '7' took 1027 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive, string '7' took 870 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive_unchecked, string '7' took 873 ms

500000000 iterations of std::stoull, string '874' took 6495 ms
500000000 iterations of std::strtoull, string '874' took 6241 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi, string '874' took 2268 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive, string '874' took 2222 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive_unchecked, string '874' took 1092 ms

500000000 iterations of std::stoull, string '123456' took 9172 ms
500000000 iterations of std::strtoull, string '123456' took 8887 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi, string '123456' took 3945 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive, string '123456' took 3883 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive_unchecked, string '123456' took 1956 ms

500000000 iterations of std::stoull, string '12345654666646' took 16413 ms
500000000 iterations of std::strtoull, string '12345654666646' took 16026 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi, string '12345654666646' took 9061 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive, string '12345654666646' took 8527 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive_unchecked, string '12345654666646' took 4154 ms

500000000 iterations of std::stoull, string '16323949897939569634' took 21772 ms
500000000 iterations of std::strtoull, string '16323949897939569634' took 21537 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi, string '16323949897939569634' took 16677 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive, string '16323949897939569634' took 15597 ms
500000000 iterations of jsteemann::atoi_positive_unchecked, string '16323949897939569634' took 6203 ms

Tests

To run the library's tests locally, execute the following commands:

mkdir -p build
(cd build && cmake ..)
build/tests/tests