How to check if an arbitrary type is an iterator?

Question

template<class T>
struct is_iterator
{
    static const bool value = ??? // What to write ???
};

int main()
{
    assert(false == is_iterator<int>::value);
    assert(true == is_iterator<vector<int>::iterator>::value);
    assert(true == is_iterator<list<int>::iterator>::value);
    assert(true == is_iterator<string::iterator>::value);
    assert(true == is_iterator<char*>::value); // a raw pointer is also an iterator
}

The question is: How to make the five assert statements pass?

Answer 1

How about something like this?

template<typename T, typename = void>
struct is_iterator
{
   static constexpr bool value = false;
};

template<typename T>
struct is_iterator<T, typename std::enable_if<!std::is_same<typename std::iterator_traits<T>::value_type, void>::value>::type>
{
   static constexpr bool value = true;
};

example:

#include <iostream>
#include <type_traits>
#include <vector>

template<typename T, typename = void>
struct is_iterator
{
   static constexpr bool value = false;
};

template<typename T>
struct is_iterator<T, typename std::enable_if<!std::is_same<typename std::iterator_traits<T>::value_type, void>::value>::type>
{
   static constexpr bool value = true;
};

int main()
{
   static_assert(!is_iterator<int>::value, "ass");
   static_assert(is_iterator<int*>::value, "ass");
   static_assert(is_iterator<std::vector<int>::iterator>::value, "ass");
}

http://liveworkspace.org/code/7dcf96c97fd0b7a69f12658fc7b2693e