C++ for Embedded & Real Time Systems

A Course Introduction

• Course Prerequisites
• Course Objectives
• Course Delivery
• Course Practical
• Course Structure

An Overview of OO Programming and C++

• Review of OOP principles
• Behavior, state, identity, inheritance, polymorphism, abstraction
• History and evolution of C++
• Key features of C++
• C++ as a better and safer C, C++ vs. C, C++ in Real Time systems

The Class Approach

• Grouping of data and functionality
• Syntax of a class declaration
• Syntax of use
• Public and private
• Abstract Data Types
• Program structure

Providing Class Functionality

• Member functions
• Function overloading
• Default arguments
• Ambiguities
• Anonymous arguments
• Resolving scope conflicts
• The Scope resolution operator
• The this pointer

Object birth and death

• Life of an object
• Constructors
• operator new
• Death of an object
• Destructors
• operator delete
• Dynamic arrays

Efficiency, Integrity and Performance Issues

• Enumerations
• Const declarations
• Const member functions
• Const member data
• Inline function mechanism
• Reference variables
• Composite Classes
• An opportunity for reuse
• Embedded / Real Time considerations

Scoping and initialization

• Order of construction
• Member Initialization lists
• Use of fundamental classes

Associative Classes

• Delegating class functionality
• Dynamic associations
• Custody and lifetime
• Constant associations

Operator Overloading

• Operator functions
• Unary operators
• Binary operators
• Global operators
• Member operators
• Subscript operators
• Input operators
• Output operators
• Guidelines
• Embedded / Real Time considerations

Class Properties

• Static data members
• Static member functions
• Nested types
• Forward declarations
• Friend classes

Templates and Container Classes

• Organizing collections of objects
• Template classes
• vector
• list
• Iterators
• Template functions
• Algorithms
• Using the Standard Library
• Embedded / Real Time considerations

Copying and Conversions

• The copy assignment operator
• Copy constructors
• Conversions to a class object
• Conversions from a class object
• Embedded / Real Time considerations

Inheritance

• Extension of existing classes
• Notation, syntax, terminology
• Protected members
• Scoping and initialization
• Multiple inheritance
• Abstract base classes
• Guidelines

Polymorphism

• Modified class behavior
• Virtual functions
• virtual destructors
• Late binding
• Inside the virtual function mechanism
• Pure virtual functions
• Use of pointers to base type
• Guidelines
• Real Time considerations

Embedded and Real Time C++ Considerations

• Comparing C and C++ performance, Performance analysis
• C++ code translated to C
• Inheritance in C
• The Embedded C++ Language Standard
• Program Size Comparisons
• Problems with Exceptions, RTTI, mutable
• Problems with Templates, Multiple Inheritance, Operator Overloading
• Compiling Embedded C++
• Making Objects ROMable
• Encapsulating a ROMable class
• Placing objects at a specific address
• Interrupts and interrupt vectors in C++
• Combining C and C++ code