As the tap in my kitchen water heater is leaking I set out to find some new parts for that thing. First try: last weekend, I went to a high-profile plumbing store (that shall not be named), and they were not able to help me as I hadn't brought the old parts, and they had no knowledge of my particular water heater. A more general parts store nearby also did not have my parts.
So, this morning, I disassembled my tap (after stocking some water), and set out to buy the wanted parts. The parts store did not have anything in stock, however, after showing my old tap to the plumber he went through some drawers and found a complete tap - costing €27.50. I was needing two, so that would have set me back €55. That's a ridiculous amount of money for solving a problem that can be solved by replacing two pieces of rubber.
Just a small code fragment to help you through the night:
#include <iostream>
#include <sstream>
#include <string>
#include <boost/foreach.hpp>
std::string repr(const std::string& s)
{
std::ostringstream ss;
BOOST_FOREACH(const char c, s) {
if ((signed char)c < 32) {