Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!crdgw1!uunet!taumet!steve From: steve@taumet.com (Stephen Clamage) Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++ Subject: Re: c++ name mangler sought Message-ID: <655@taumet.com> Date: 4 Apr 91 17:31:44 GMT References: <71574@microsoft.UUCP> <41560@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> <1991Apr3.170401.4903@netcom.COM> <18279@cadillac.CAD.MCC.COM> Distribution: usa Organization: Taumetric Corporation, San Diego Lines: 40 ned@pebbles.cad.mcc.com (Ned Nowotny) writes: >Some of us would also like to link objects compiled by one C++ compiler with >objects compiled by another. Is the ANSI C++ committee looking into linking >and C++ object libraries? Or, does anyone care about libraries; modules as >opposed to classes; name space pollution; interoperability with compilers for >C, C++, Ada, etc. which may, by necessity, come from different vendors; and >so on? The ANSI C++ committee is interested in these issues. Some of these cannot be addressed. For example, how can the C++ commitee specify what an Ada compiler must do? Is it right to *require* that a conforming C++ compiler be able to link to Ada programs? What if there is no Ada compiler for the intended host? What if one becomes available the day after the C++ compiler is released? What if there are two incompatible Ada compilers on the system -- is it enough to support just one of them? If the committee addresses object libraries, we must specify how it is to be done on all possible systems, an impossible job. Programmers usually think in terms of a compiler which works with text files to produce object files which are then linked into a self-contained executable file. NOT ONE OF THESE ELEMENTS IS NECESSARY -- text files, an identifiable compiler, identifiable object files, separate executable files. There are already other ways to make programs, and we do not want to prevent still better methods of making them from coming about. The name-space pollution problem is a thorny one. There have been some proposals, none of which was judged adequate. The issue always seems to hang up on the idea of a central clearing-house for names. How is this to be done, remembering that international cooperation is required? Real-world programmers are rightly concerned with getting their jobs done efficiently now. Standards committees have to keep such things in mind while looking toward the future. -- Steve Clamage, TauMetric Corp, steve@taumet.com