Using std::span for contiguous sequences of objects

In C++17, the std::string_view type was added to the standard library. This is an object that represents a view over a constant contiguous sequence of characters. The view is typically implemented with a pointer to the first element of the sequence and a length. Strings are one of the data types that are most used in any programming language, and having a non-owning view that does not allocate memory, avoids copies, and has some operations faster than std::string, which is an important benefit. However, a string is just a special vector of characters with operations specific for text. Therefore, it makes sense to have a type that is a view of a contiguous sequence of objects, regardless of their type. This is what the std::span class template in C++20 represents. We could say that std::span is to std::vector and array types what std::string_view is to std::string.

Getting ready

The std::span class template is available in...