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From: mjv@objects.mv.com (Michael J. Vilot)
Newsgroups: comp.std.c++
Subject: Re: design by committee (was: templates and exceptions in g++?)
Message-ID: <1016@zinn.MV.COM>
Date: 21 Nov 90 18:42:24 GMT
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Henry Spencer ``hoisted a storm warning'' about the dangers of standards
committees who invent language features, particularly when they ignore the
experience gained through ``prior art.''  I agree with him about the potential
danger.  However, as Bjarne pointed out, there is little evidence of it in the
current membership of the X3J16 committee (OK, there is some, but they're in
the minority ;-).

I'd like to contribute a couple of thoughts.  First, the example of the `noalias
episode of X3J11 was indelibly impressed upon the members of X3J16 who attended
the March meeting.  The sentiment to avoid a repetition is high on the list of
reasons I've heard cited for resisting gratuitous inventions.  On the other
hand, there seems to be sincere desire to do better than trigraphs as a way to
satisfy the legitimate needs of national character sets.

Second, we face a difficult situation when specifying the components of the C++
standard library.  Most of us, as C++ users, have used AT&T's `cfront' or a
derivative.  That means that `streams' (1.2), `iostreams' (2.0), `complex' and
(in some cases) `tasks' constitute the bulk of ``prior art'' in the area of a
standard library for C++ (I consider InterViews, NIHCL, libg++, and others as
libraries distinct from the standard -- which might be an interesting thread).

The availability of templates and exceptions has a substantial impact on how I
design libraries in C++.  I would hope that the library portion of the C++ 
standard would make the best use of the language.  Yet we have little ``prior
art'' in libraries using these features -- particularly the I/O classes.  On the
other hand, we should not gratuitously invalidate the existing C++ code using
streams.

It's a difficult design challenge -- I hope you will contribute your thoughts.

--
Mike Vilot,  ObjectWare Inc, Nashua NH
mjv@objects.mv.com  (UUCP:  ...!decvax!zinn!objects!mjv)