Force narrowing conversion warning

Question

Consider the following code that illustrates some narrowing conversions:

template <class T>
class wrapper 
{   
    template <class> friend class wrapper;
    public:
        constexpr wrapper(T value)
        : _data(value)
        {}
        template <class U>
        constexpr wrapper(wrapper<U> other)
        : _data(other._data) 
        {}
        wrapper& operator=(T value)
        {_data = value; return *this;}
        template <class U>
        wrapper& operator=(wrapper<U> other)
        {_data = other._data; return *this;}
    private:
        T _data;
};

int main(int argc, char* argv[]) 
{
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper1 = 5U;
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper2{5U};
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper3(5U);
    wrapper<unsigned int> wrapper4 = 5U;
    wrapper<unsigned int> wrapper5{5U};
    wrapper<unsigned int> wrapper6(5U);
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper7 = wrapper4;  // Narrowing
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper8{wrapper5};  // Narrowing
    wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper9(wrapper6);  // Narrowing
    wrapper7 = wrapper4;  // Narrowing
    wrapper8 = wrapper5;  // Narrowing
    wrapper9 = wrapper6;  // Narrowing
    return 0;
}

How to change the body of the wrapper members, so that it triggers the compiler warning for narrowing conversion? My goal is to make the user aware that something is potentially wrong with their code.

Answer 1

You can trigger a narrowing conversion warning with uniform initialization syntax:

class wrapper 
{   
    template <class> friend class wrapper;
    public:
        constexpr wrapper(T value)
        : _data{value}
        {}
        template <class U>
        constexpr wrapper(wrapper<U> other)
        : _data{other._data} // note the curly brackets here
        {}
        wrapper& operator=(T value)
        {_data = value; return *this;}
        template <class U>
        wrapper& operator=(wrapper<U> other)
        {_data = {other._data}; return *this;} // and here
    private:
        T _data;
};

with

wrapper<unsigned int> wrapper1 = 5U;
wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper2 = wrapper1;  // Narrowing
wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper3(wrapper1);  // Narrowing
wrapper<unsigned char> wrapper4{wrapper1};  // Narrowing
wrapper2 = wrapper1;  // Narrowing

any of the four last lines will produce a narrowing conversion warning in g++, and compilation errors from the narrowing conversions in clang.