C++ Templates: The Complete Guide

Chapter 14. The Polymorphic Power of Templates

Polymorphism is the ability to associate different specific behaviors with a single generic notation.¹ Polymorphism is also a cornerstone of the object-oriented programming paradigm, which in C++ is supported mainly through class inheritance and virtual functions. Because these mechanism are (at least in part) handled at run time, we talk about dynamic polymorphism. This is usually what is thought of when talking about plain polymorphism in C++. However, templates also allow us to associate different specific behaviors with a single generic notation, but this association is generally handled at compile time, which we refer to as static polymorphism. In this chapter we review the two forms of polymorphism ...