Constructing data pools for components

Question

I'm running Windows 7 with a Core Duo. I've been using Codeblocks for a while now, which I think I have using GNU compiler.

I have (or will have) many component classes that inherit from the abstract class Component. I need help establishing a system to house memory pools for an undetermined amount of component types, each with an undetermined amount of components. Maybe for the sake of argument the latter is fixed, I can figure out how to change size when abolutely necessary.

Also, conveniently so, each component type has an ID (unsigned short) from 0 to whatever with no holes. Yay!

So, assuming I have some managing clas to keep track of array sizes and things, would something like this work?

class Component {};

class FooComponent: public Component {};
class BarComponent: public Component {};
.
.
.

std::vector<Component*> pool_list;

// returns pointer to beginning of pool
Component* foo_pool = MethodToCreateComponentPool(/* Params */)
Component* bar_pool = MethodToCreateComponentPool(/* Params */)

pool_list.push_back(foo_pool);
pool_list.push_back(bar_pool);

Maybe put sizeof(FooComponent) in for Params.

Then (Where I really start to not know what to do) inside the function do an malloc( START_COUNT * component_size)

I have no experience allocating memory like this. I can easily set up something like

vector< vector<Component*>* > or
map<unsigned short, vector<Component*> >

but it (is ugly for one) doesn't give me contiguous pools. I need cache friendly :)

Ideas? Patterns? Idioms? Help?

Answer 1

I got wrapped up in how I was implementing this and lost track of what I really needed. Which is basically this post.

Thanks.