Why no emplacement iterators in C++11 or C++14?

Question

C++98 has front_inserter, back_inserter, and inserter, but there don\'t seem to be any emplacement versions of these in C++11 or draft

Answer 1

Is there any technical reason we couldn't have front_emplacer, back_emplacer, and emplacer?

No, there is no technical reason. As proof, here is a complete implementation of back_emplacer with a demo of your Use Case 1...

#include <iterator>
#include <vector>
#include <iostream>

template<class Container>
class back_emplace_iterator : public std::iterator< std::output_iterator_tag,
                                                   void, void, void, void >
{
protected:
    Container* container;
public:
    typedef Container container_type;

    explicit back_emplace_iterator(Container& x) : container(&x) {}

    template<class T>
    back_emplace_iterator<Container>&
    operator=(T&& t)
    {
        container->emplace_back(std::forward<T>(t));
        return *this;
    }

    back_emplace_iterator& operator*() { return *this; }
    back_emplace_iterator& operator++() { return *this; }
    back_emplace_iterator& operator++(int) { return *this; }
};

template< class Container >
inline back_emplace_iterator<Container>
back_emplacer( Container& c )
{
    return back_emplace_iterator<Container>(c);
}

struct Demo
{
    int i;
    Demo(int i) : i(i) {}
};

int main()
{
    std::vector<int> x = {1,2,3,4,5};

    std::vector<Demo> y;

    std::copy(x.begin(), x.end(), back_emplacer(y));

    for (auto d : y)
        std::cout << d.i << std::endl;
}

Possible Known Issue: Does the universal reference of operator= hide an implicitly generated copy/move operator=? If so these need to be explicitly defined in a way that beats the universal reference in overload resolution.

Answer 2

Your main use case is already covered by inserter, back_inserter and front_inserter. There is already a value_type && overload of operator= that will move into the container. The only thing emplacer could do over inserter is call explicit constructors.

Compare the common overloads of container::insert, container::push_back and container::push_front to container::emplace, container::emplace_back and container::emplace_front

iterator insert( const_iterator pos, const value_type & value );
iterator insert( const_iterator pos, value_type && value );

template< class... Args > 
iterator emplace( const_iterator pos, Args&&... args );

void push_back( const value_type & value );
void push_back( value_type && value );

template< class... Args >
void emplace_back( Args&&... args );

void push_front( const value_type & value );
void push_front( value_type && value );

template< class... Args >
void emplace_front( Args&&... args );

Each of the emplace variants takes a pack of arguments with which to construct the value. operator = takes exactly one argument. You could write an emplacer that took a tuple of arguments.

template<class Container>
class back_emplace_iterator : public std::iterator< std::output_iterator_tag,
                                                   void, void, void, void >
{
protected:
    Container* container;
public:
    typedef Container container_type;

    explicit back_emplace_iterator(Container& x) : container(&x) {}

    template<typename ... Args>
    back_emplace_iterator<Container>&
    operator=(std::tuple<Args&&...> args)
    {
        std::apply(Container::emplace_back, std::tuple_cat(std::tie(*container), std::forward<std::tuple<Args&&...>>(args)));
        return *this;
    }

    back_emplace_iterator& operator*() { return *this; }
    back_emplace_iterator& operator++() { return *this; }
    back_emplace_iterator& operator++(int) { return *this; }
};