STLSoft 1.10 new additions: integer_to_array()

A new component with STLSoft 1.10 (alpha 11 onwards) is the stlsoft::integer_to_array() function template. It is used to turn a single integer value into an array of bit-chunk values.

For example, given the integer i with value 0x01020304, we can split this into the 8 nibbles as follows:

stlsoft::integer_array r = stlsoft::integer_to_array(i, 4);

r[0] will be 4, r[1] will be 0, r[2] will be 3, r[3] will be 0, r[4] will be 2, r[5] will be 0, r[6] will be 1, and r[7] will be 0.

The split can be on any value between 0 and the bitsize of the input parameter (which can be any of the integral types); so you can split on 3 bits, 1 bit, 17 bits, whatever.

I've done extensive automated tests, and they all pass (natch), but I'm still a little dubious about the component, so I'm definitely interested in feedback.

In case you're wondering, the original rationale for this was a simple way to go from the s_addr member of struct in_addr, which is held in network byte order but is otherwise "opaque".