PrototypeSTL

A high-performance, embedded-friendly C++ standard library alternative.

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What is PrototypeSTL?

PrototypeSTL is a header-only C++ library that provides STL-compatible containers, algorithms, and utilities designed for performance-critical and resource-constrained environments. It synthesizes proven patterns from three industry-leading libraries into a single, cohesive toolkit.

Design Goals

Goal	How We Achieve It
Zero-cost abstractions	No virtual dispatch, no hidden heap allocations
Deterministic memory	Custom allocators with compile-time capacity bounds
Cache efficiency	Contiguous storage, flat containers, SBO optimization
Portability	C++11 baseline, no platform-specific dependencies
Safety	Bounds checking in debug, static analysis friendly

Quick Example

#include <prototype/containers/vector.hpp>
#include <prototype/allocators/arena_allocator.hpp>
#include <prototype/algorithms/sort.hpp>

// Create a 4KB memory arena on the stack
prototype::memory_arena<4096> arena;
prototype::arena_allocator<int> alloc(arena);

// Vector allocates from the arena zero heap usage
prototype::vector<int, prototype::arena_allocator<int>> prices(alloc);
prices.push_back(142);
prices.push_back(89);
prices.push_back(237);

// Sort in-place
prototype::sort(prices.begin(), prices.end());

Feature Matrix

Category	Components
Containers	vector, fixed_vector, array, list, deque, string, span, optional, variant, bitset, flat_map, flat_set, ring_buffer, static_map, stack, queue
Algorithms	sort, find, copy, fill, transform, partition, merge, rotate, heap, numeric
Allocators	memory_arena, arena_allocator, pool_allocator, stack_allocator
Iterators	reverse_iterator, move_iterator, iterator_traits, advance/distance
Functors	comparators, arithmetic, logical, function, hash
Concurrency	atomic, spinlock, spsc_queue

Getting Started

See the Getting Started guide for installation and first steps.