Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!asgard!serge
From: serge@asgard.uucp (serge)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: const, reference "this" revisited ???
Message-ID: <23134@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 26 Feb 88 23:28:41 GMT
References: <6590014@hplsla.HP.COM> <6590018@hplsla.HP.COM>
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: serge@berkeley.edu (serge)
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 19

In article <6590018@hplsla.HP.COM> jima@hplsla.HP.COM (Jim Adcock) writes:
>So my only thought was if there was someway to state a given vfuncX() DOES
>NOT clobber *this then this and this->vtable would only have to be loaded
>into registers once at the start of vfunction, and thereafter calling a 
>vfuncX() would only entail an indirect-with-offset function call.

	This issue (and others) could be addressed if the method
definition/invocation syntax was

		method(x, y, z ...);

instead of
		x.method(y, z ...);

This would have the advantage that

	+ one could specify attributes of `this' (const, reference, etc.)
	+ there would no longer be a need for `this' keyword
	+ syntax would be simpler and more uniform (method == overload)
	+ it would allow for multiply polymorphic methods (!)