c++ - std::unordered_map::find using a type different than the Key type?

Question

I have an unordered_map that uses a string-type as a key:

std::unordered_map<string, value> map;

A std::hash specialization is provided for string, as well as a suitable operator==.

Now I also have a "string view" class, which is a weak pointer into an existing string, avoiding heap allocations:

class string_view {
    string *data;
    size_t begin, len;
    // ...
};  

Now I'd like to be able to check if a key exists in the map using a string_view object. Unfortunately, std::unordered_map::find takes a Key argument, not a generic T argument.

(Sure, I can "promote" one to a string, but that causes an allocation I'd like to avoid.)

What I would've liked instead was something like

template<class Key, class Value>
class unordered_map
{
    template<class T> iterator find(const T &t);
};

which would require operator==(T, Key) and std::hash<T>() to be suitably defined, and would return an iterator to a matching value.

Is there any workaround?

Answer 1

P0919R2 Heterogeneous lookup for unordered containers has been merged in the C++2a's working draft!

The abstract seems a perfect match w.r.t. my original question :-)

Abstract

This proposal adds heterogeneous lookup support to the unordered associative containers in the C++ Standard Library. As a result, a creation of a temporary key object is not needed when different (but compatible) type is provided as a key to the member function. This also makes unordered and regular associative container interfaces and functionality more compatible with each other.

With the changes proposed by this paper the following code will work without any additional performance hits:

template<typename Key, typename Value>
using h_str_umap = std::unordered_map<Key, Value, string_hash>;
h_str_umap<std::string, int> map = /* ... */;
map.find("This does not create a temporary std::string object :-)"sv);