New subject: [C++-SIG] Automatic Python/C++ Wrapper

March 19, 1998

      Hi Everybody,

since I would like to use Python as a high level control language in a
C++ project, I'm interested in a simple way to wrap C++ objects into
Python objects. However, the existing solutions (like SWIG) seem to be
rather complicated. So I implemented an new tool 'Python<C++>', which is
inlcuded below. Unlike previous approaches, my tool makes use of
templates to automate the generation of wrapper objects. This allows to:

- keep the entire wrapping tool in just 3 header files (no library
  or code generator required)
- keep the C++ code essentially independent of Python (no inheritance
  from PyObject or similar required)

Suppose, you want to wrap this function:

  double foo(double, double);

To wrap it, you simply write:

  pyWrapFunction(foo, foo);

where the first argument will become the Python identifier of the
function, while the second is a pointer to the C++ function. In Python,
you would call the function like this:
...
...
...
foo(1.0, 2.0)
Likewise, a class 

  class Foo
  {
    public:
      Foo();
      virtual ~Foo();
      virtual int foo_method(int, int);
  };

is wrapped as follows:

  pyWrapClass(Foo, Foo);

where the first argument is the Python class name, the second the C++
class name. Methods are wrapped similarly to functions:

  pyWrapMethod(Foo, bar, &Foo::foo_method);

whith the first two arguments being the Python class and method names,
and the last a pointer to a C++ member function. To wrap constructors,
the argument list is given instead of a function pointer (pointers to
constructors do not exist in C++):

  pyWrapDefaultConstructor(Foo, Foo);

We use class Foo in Python like this:
...
...
...
x = Foo()
x.foo_method(1,2);
del x
Inheritance is also supported:

  class Bar : public Foo
  {};

  pyWrapClass(Bar, Bar);
  pyDeclareBaseClass(Bar, Foo);
  pyWrapDefaultConstructor(Bar, Bar);

Thus, the Python class Bar is declared a subclass of the Python class
Foo - it inherits all methods and is convertible into a base object in
an expression. (This code only compiles iff the C++ class Bar is indeed
a direct or indirect subclass of the C++ class Foo). In Python, we use
Bar like this:
...
...
...
x = Bar()
x.foo_method(1,2);   # inherited from Foo
del x
Other features of 'Python<C++>' include support for multiple
inheritance, virtual base classes, abstract classes, translation of C++
exceptions into Python exceptions, mapping of Python tuples (up to 5
members) and (homogeneous) lists onto PyWrapperTuple and
PyWrapperArray.  

The module 'cxxmodule.cxx' included in the tar file illustrates some of
these features (sorry, no documentation exists yet). I have successfully
compiled and used the module under Python 1.5, GNU g++ 2.8.0, on a UNIX
machine. The script 'test.py' is provided to test the module. The
expected output is contained in 'testout.txt'. To try:

  g++ -fpic -I$PYTHON_INCLUDE -c cxxmodule.cxx -o cxxmodule.o
  g++ -shared -o cxxmodule.so cxxmodule.o
  python test.py >& out.txt
  diff out.txt testout.txt

I hope you enjoy the package. Any comments are very welcome.

Regards, Ulli

-- 

 _____________________________________________________________
|                                                             |
| Ullrich Koethe   Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics |
|                  Rostock                                    |
|                                                             |
| Phone: +49-381-4024-114         Joachim-Jungius-Str. 9      |
| Fax:   +49-381-4024-199         D - 18059 Rostock           |
| Email: koethe@egd.igd.fhg.de    Germany                     |
|_____________________________________________________________|

Automatic Python/C++ Wrapper

Ullrich Koethe

Patrick Miller

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