[GD-General] stl on consoles

[Raymond L. M. <ra...@wa...>]

    Hello!  I seriously do not want this to turn into some sort of =
programming war but I just want to hear the experiences and knowledge of =
fellow game developers on this subject.  Here we go.  I've used STL =
before in my PC products and I happen to like it.  I like that the =
algorithms are solid and very complete, and some of the containers such =
as the std::map are invaluable to me.  The biggest gripe I've had with =
it was debugging.  If you have an iterator than getting to the actual =
data in the debugger is horrible (unless there is some other way to =
access it I don't know).  The other problem was with the memory =
allocations and that unless you specify an allocator it allocates as it =
sees fit.  Now on the PC I wasn't too worried about the allocation bit =
and I figured the operating system would take care of the memory =
management and everything would be fine (which it was). Now today I'm =
developing a console game (PS2/XBox) where memory is a precious resource =
not to be spent carelessly.  I know that Pete Isensee has written an =
article on overriding the memory allocator in Game Gems 3 that should =
take care of the allocation problem.  I still get the feeling that STL =
is not very common in console programming and would like to know why.  =
I've written my own templated container types, except for std::map, =
which seem nice and light and much easier to debug but I'm not sure if I =
should use them if STL provides them and there are no penalties for =
using them(memory problems, code bloat, unsuitable routines for the =
cpu).  If you could please tell me if you are working on a console title =
using STL or not and why you do or do not use them.  I appreciate =
everybody's time and thank you.

    Raymond L. Maple
    WayForward Technologies

P.S. I posted this on gda...@li... but was =
told it was an inappropriate subject for that list so I'm posting it =
here also.