Using Lambdas, Function Objects, and Restricted Functions

The C++ AMP code that you want to run on the accelerator is specified as an argument in a call to the parallel_for_each method. You can provide either a lambda expression or a function object (functor) as that argument. Additionally, the lambda expression or function object can call a C++ AMP-restricted function. This topic uses an array addition algorithm to demonstrate lambdas, function objects, and restricted functions. The following example shows the algorithm without C++ AMP code. Two 1-dimensional arrays of equal length are created. The corresponding integer elements are added and stored in a third 1-dimensional array. C++ AMP is not used.

void CpuMethod() {

    int aCPP[] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
    int bCPP[] = {6, 7, 8, 9, 10};
    int sumCPP[5];

    for (int idx = 0; idx <5; idx++)
    {
        sumCPP[idx] = aCPP[idx] + bCPP[idx];
    }

    for (int idx = 0; idx <5; idx++)
    {
        std::cout <<sumCPP[idx] <<"\n";
    }
}

Lambda Expression

Using a lambda expression is the most direct way to use C++ AMP to rewrite the code.

void AddArraysWithLambda() {
    int aCPP[] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
    int bCPP[] = {6, 7, 8, 9, 10};
    int sumCPP[5];

    array_view<const int, 1> a(5, aCPP);

    array_view<const int, 1> b(5, bCPP);

    array_view<int, 1> sum(5, sumCPP);

    sum.discard_data();

    parallel_for_each(
        sum.extent,
        [=](index<1> idx) restrict(amp)
        {
             sum[idx] = a[idx] + b[idx];
        });

    for (int i = 0; i <5; i++) {
        std::cout <<sum[i] <<"\n";
    }
}

The lambda expression must include one indexing parameter and must include restrict(amp). In the example, the array_viewsum object has a rank of 1. Therefore, the parameter to the lambda statement is an index object that has rank 1. At runtime, the lambda expression is executed once for each element in the array_view object. For more information, see Lambda Expression Syntax.

Function Object

You can factor the accelerator code into a function object.

class AdditionFunctionObject
{
public:
    AdditionFunctionObject(const array_view<int, 1>& a,
    const array_view<int, 1>& b,
    const array_view<int, 1>& sum)
    : a(a), b(b), sum(sum)
    {
    }

    void operator()(index<1> idx) restrict(amp)
    {
        sum[idx] = a[idx] + b[idx];
    }

private:
    array_view<int, 1> a;
    array_view<int, 1> b;
    array_view<int, 1> sum;
};

void AddArraysWithFunctionObject() {
    int aCPP[] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
    int bCPP[] = {6, 7, 8, 9, 10};
    int sumCPP[5];

    array_view<const int, 1> a(5, aCPP);

    array_view<const int, 1> b(5, bCPP);

    array_view<int, 1> sum(5, sumCPP);

    sum.discard_data();

    parallel_for_each(
        sum.extent,
        AdditionFunctionObject(a, b, sum));

    for (int i = 0; i <5; i++) {
        std::cout <<sum[i] <<"\n";
    }
}

The function object must include a constructor and must include an overload of the function call operator. The function call operator must include one indexing parameter. An instance of the function object is passed as the second argument to the parallel_for_each method. In this example, three array_view objects are passed to the function object constructor. The array_view object sum has a rank of 1. Therefore, the parameter to the function call operator is an index object that has rank 1. At runtime, the function is executed once for each element in the array_view object. For more information, see Function Call and Function Objects in the C++ Standard Library.

C++ AMP-Restricted Function

You can further factor the accelerator code by creating a restricted function and calling it from a lambda expression or a function object. The following code example demonstrates how to call a restricted function from a lambda expression.

void AddElementsWithRestrictedFunction(index<1> idx, array_view<int, 1> sum, array_view<int, 1> a, array_view<int, 1> b) restrict(amp)
{
    sum[idx] = a[idx] + b[idx];
}

void AddArraysWithFunction() {

    int aCPP[] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
    int bCPP[] = {6, 7, 8, 9, 10};
    int sumCPP[5];

    array_view<int, 1> a(5, aCPP);

    array_view<int, 1> b(5, bCPP);

    array_view<int, 1> sum(5, sumCPP);

    sum.discard_data();

    parallel_for_each(
        sum.extent,
        [=](index<1> idx) restrict(amp)
        {
            AddElementsWithRestrictedFunction(idx, sum, a, b);
        });

    for (int i = 0; i <5; i++) {
        std::cout <<sum[i] <<"\n";
    }
}

The restricted function must include restrict(amp) and conform to the restrictions that are described in restrict (C++ AMP).

See also

C++ AMP (C++ Accelerated Massive Parallelism)
Lambda Expression Syntax
Function Call
Function Objects in the C++ Standard Library
restrict (C++ AMP)