testing

How to write a good unit test

When writing unit tests, remember to make them BRIEF: Brief, Reliable, Independent, Explicit, Focused.

CMake

Report __cplusplus correctly with CMake and Visual Studio

How to ensure MSVC sets the __cplusplus macro correctly when managing the build with CMake.

CMake

Percent-sign in preprocessor definition breaks CMake Visual Studio generator

Percent-signs are special characters under certain circumstances on Windows. This can cause problems when configuring software builds with CMake.

CMake

Path error when building with Conan and CMake

An autorun registry entry left behind by Conda can cause Conan/CMake builds to fail on Windows

CMake

Workaround for nvcc pthread issue

There seems to be a bug in certain versions of CMake which cause the CUDA compiler (nvcc) to fail. Using another version of CMake resolves the problem.

email

Importing email folders into Gmail

POP doesn't support folders. This can make it tricky if you want to migrate emails which have been organised into folders. This article outlines some possible solutions when migrating into GMail.

python

Why Python 3 doesn't write the Unicode BOM

Python doesn't always output a Unicode Byte Order Mark. This can cause problems for programs which expect to see it. This post outlines when and why Python doesn't output the BOM, and how to fix it.

python

Output file encoding in Python 3

How to specify which Unicode encoding to use for reading or writing text files in Python 3.

localisation

Generate UTF-8 dictionaries using gettext

How to force the gettext tools to generate a dictionary with UTF-8 encoding, even when the original translation strings only contain ASCII.

c++

Decimal places in a floating point number

The floating point format has variable precision depending on the number it represents. This post examines how many decimal places would fit in a floating point number, and how useful that information really is.

batch

Emit audible warning from a batch script

How to make a Windows batch script emit an audible beep.

c++

How to check that a function is constexpr

This post gives a simple technique to verify that a C++ function can be evaluated at compile time.

c++

C++ constexpr functions

C++11 introduced constexpr functions which can be evaluated at compile time. This post outlines some ways of using this helpful feature.

c++

Using C++ templates for size-based type selection

How to use std::conditional to automatically select an appropriate size of integer based on template parameters in C++.

c++

Pure virtual final functions in C++

A quirk of C++ allows you to define a member function which can never be implemented, in a class which can never be instantiated.

c++

Order of parameter evaluation in C++

When calling a function in C/C++, the parameters are not necessarily evaluated in the order you expect. This can lead to some tricky bugs if your code has conflicting side effects.

c++

MFC prevents bad_alloc from being thrown

The MFC library interferes with standard behaviour of the new operator in C++. You may need to handle a different exception type to detect failed allocations.

c++

Convert a number to a binary string (and back) in C++

How to convert numbers to and from binary strings in C++ using the bitset class.

Windows

Changing the emulation mode of the Microsoft Web Browser ActiveX control

An ActiveX browser control may emulate IE7 by default. This behaviour can be changed using a registry key.

Windows

NSIS Access Control problem with built-in users group

User group names on Windows Vista onwards are localised strings. When setting file permissions in an installer, you may need to use a Security Identifier instead.

electronics

What is a serial-to-parallel shift register?

Serial-to-parallel shift registers are fairly simple components which can be helpful for increasing the number of outputs from devices like Raspberry Pi and Arduino.

visual-studio

Automatically output the callstack on a breakpoint in Visual Studio

How to automatically output a stack trace when a C++ breakpoint is hit in Visual Studio.

c++

Understanding C++11 move semantics

An introduction to using move operations in C++.

c++

C++11 auto variables

An overview of the C++ auto keyword for deducing type information in variable declarations.

c++

Improve C++ performance in debug mode with inline expansion

Debug builds of C++ programs sometimes run very slowly. This post suggests one possible technique for speeding it up.