[PyQt] sip %ConvertToSubClassCode problem with %TypeHeaderCode doesn't work as expected.

[Phil Thompson]

On Wed, 02 Jun 2010 17:20:26 -0400, Blaine Bell
<blaine.bell at schrodinger.com> wrote:
> I am new to using SIP, and I find it *very* difficult to find reasonable 
> documentation and examples to do what I need to do.  I want to be able 
> to have SIP automatically cast my instances to a subclass.  I am using 
> "%ConvertToSubClassCode" that uses dynamic_cast<> to figure out whether 
> the sipCpp is my class, and if it is, then I convert it to the related 
> sip class.  Here is the snippet of my code:
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> class ChmMainWindow : ChmBaseView
> {
> %TypeHeaderCode
> #include "chmmainwindow.h"
> %End
> %ConvertToSubClassCode
>     ChmMainWindow *mw = dynamic_cast<ChmMainWindow *>(sipCpp);
>     if (mw){
>         sipClass = sipAPI_canvasapp->api_find_class("ChmMainWindow");
>     } else {
>         sipClass = NULL;
>     }
> %End
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A few problems with the above code...

sipClass is deprecated, use sipType instead.

There is no need to search for a type if you know its name at compile time,
so...

     if (mw){
         sipType = sipType_ChmMainWindow;
     } else {
         sipType = NULL;
     }

If you do want to use the C API then use the function names...

    sipType = sipFindType("ChmMainWindow");

> However, the compiler fails to recognize the "ChmMainWindow" class when 
> compiling the sipcanvasappcmodule.cpp file because the %TypeHeaderCode 
> does not get put into that file before this code. (i.e., this code only 
> gets put into the actual SIP wrapper cpp file).  My workaround is to put 
> this "#include "chmmainwindow.h" into a different %TypeHeaderCode block 
> further down the SIP file, and this seems to work fine (I am not sure 
> why some %TypeHeaderCode blocks get put into the cmodule and some others 
> do not).

%TypeHeaderCode is only placed in the sip*cmodule.cpp if sip thinks it is
needed. To explicitly add code to this file use the %ModuleCode directive.

> Also, I am not sure why (forgive my ignorance) this isn't the default 
> behavior?  Why shouldn't subclasses implemented in SIP get converted by 
> default?

Because there is no standard way to do the conversion. Unless you have
control over how the underlying library is built you can't guarantee that
compiler generated RTTI is available.

> I see the Qt code implements all of the casting in one object 
> (i.e., QApplication), is it a performance issue?

Putting all the code in one place (per module, per class hierarchy) does
generate less code and will be slightly faster, but it isn't required.

Phil