Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!decwrl!infopiz!lupine!rfg
From: rfg@NCD.COM (Ron Guilmette)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: What is the cv-qualifier of a reference?
Message-ID: <4867@lupine.NCD.COM>
Date: 6 Apr 91 02:31:43 GMT
References: <NGO.91Apr2153525@tammy.harvard.edu+
Distribution: comp
Organization: Network Computing Devices, Inc., Mt. View, CA
Lines: 32

In article <NGO.91Apr2153525@tammy.harvard.edu+ ngo@tammy.harvard.edu (Tom Ngo) writes:
+
+[What I don't understand]  A reference can have a cv-qualifier, e.g.
+
+                               int &const j;
+
+                           What does const mean in this case?  What
+                           restrictions are placed on j?

Tom,

Perhaps nobody answered your question because nobody knows what a
cv-qualified reference means (including Bjarne I think, although
I certainly *cannot* and *do not* speak for him).

Like you, others (including me) have been mystified by this question in
the past and have sought clarification.  To the best of my knowledge,
no clarification has been forthcomming from any quarter.

You can view this as either a problem or an opportunity.  It is a problem
if you really need the language to be precisely specified at this point
in time.  However it is an opportinity for you (and others) to join the
x3j16 standardization committee, make up your own "meaning" for cv-qualified
references, and then have lengthy arguments with other x3j16 members
about whether or not your "meaning" is either useful or necessary.  (It's
great fun if you're into that sort of thing.)

-- 

// Ron ("Shoot From The Hip") Guilmette
// Internet: rfg@ncd.com      uucp: ...uunet!lupine!rfg
// New motto:  If it ain't broke, try using a bigger hammer.