to_string is not a member of std, says g++ (mingw)

I am making a small vocabulary remembering program where words would would be flashed at me randomly for meanings. I want to use standard C++ library as Bjarne Stroustroup tells us, but I have encountered a seemingly strange problem right out of the gate.

I want to change a long integer into std::string so as to be able to store it in a file. I have employed to_string() for the same. The problem is, when I compile it with g++ (version 4.7.0 as mentioned in its --‍version flag), it says:

PS C:\Users\Anurag\SkyDrive\College\Programs> g++ -std=c++0x ttd.cpp
ttd.cpp: In function 'int main()':
ttd.cpp:11:2: error: 'to_string' is not a member of 'std'

My program that gives this error is:

#include <string>

int main()
{
    std::to_string(0);
    return 0;
}

But, I know it can't be because msdn library clearly says it exists and an earlier question on Stack Overflow (for g++ version 4.5) says that it can be turned on with the -std=c++0x flag. What am I doing wrong?

Solution 1:

This is a known bug under MinGW. Relevant Bugzilla. In the comments section you can get a patch to make it work with MinGW.

This issue has been fixed in MinGW-w64 distros higher than GCC 4.8.0 provided by the MinGW-w64 project. Despite the name, the project provides toolchains for 32-bit along with 64-bit. The Nuwen MinGW distro also solves this issue.

Solution 2:

#include <string>
#include <sstream>

namespace patch
{
    template < typename T > std::string to_string( const T& n )
    {
        std::ostringstream stm ;
        stm << n ;
        return stm.str() ;
    }
}

#include <iostream>

int main()
{
    std::cout << patch::to_string(1234) << '\n' << patch::to_string(1234.56) << '\n' ;
}

do not forget to include #include <sstream>

Solution 3:

As suggested this may be an issue with your compiler version.

Try using the following code to convert a long to std::string:

#include <sstream>
#include <string>
#include <iostream>

int main() {
    std::ostringstream ss;
    long num = 123456;
    ss << num;
    std::cout << ss.str() << std::endl;
}

Solution 4:

Use this function...

    #include<sstream>
    template <typename T>
    std::string to_string(T value)
    {
      //create an output string stream
      std::ostringstream os ;

      //throw the value into the string stream
      os << value ;

      //convert the string stream into a string and return
      return os.str() ;
    }

    //you can also do this
    //std::string output;
    //os >> output;  //throw whats in the string stream into the string

Solution 5:

to_string is a current issue with Cygwin

Here's a new-ish answer to an old thread. A new one did come up but was quickly quashed, Cygwin: g++ 5.2: ‘to_string’ is not a member of ‘std’.

Too bad, maybe we would have gotten an updated answer. According to @Alex, Cygwin g++ 5.2 is still not working as of November 3, 2015.

On January 16, 2015 Corinna Vinschen, a Cygwin maintainer at Red Hat said the problem was a shortcoming of newlib. It doesn't support most long double functions and is therefore not C99 aware.

Red Hat is,

... still hoping to get the "long double" functionality into newlib at one point.

On October 25, 2015 Corrine also said,

It would still be nice if somebody with a bit of math knowledge would contribute the missing long double functions to newlib.

So there we have it. Maybe one of us who has the knowledge, and the time, can contribute and be the hero.

Newlib is here.