I have been writing a lot of generic code recently that needs to operate on boost::array, std::vector, and ublas::vector<br /><br />I have found the lack of operator[] for random element access to be a real pain for writing generic code, and it seems to be inconsistent with the others.  I understand the rationale for not having operators[] on ublas::matrix, to be discussed later, but why cannot operator() and operator[] call the same code for ublas::vector?  Am I missing something?  Right now my workaround is to use .begin() and then use the random access iterator concept implemented by all of these iterators.  But this is really ugly for many cases.<br /><br /><br />For ublas::matrix.  I am also having trouble writing generic code that works for normal C 2D arrays and with boost::multi_array.  Here, boost::multi_array implements the [] operator which I assume passes back either a value or an iterator depending on the dimension. The result is that for both normal C and boost::multi_array, I can use the: mycontainer[0][1] notation.  Now, I understand why ublas::matrix relies on the operator() for access, and why it is more efficient, but is there any way to also implement [] operators in a similar way to multi_array (passing back an iterator if called on the matrix and a value if called on the matrix column/row iterator)?  This would make generic code a lot easier to write.  Alternatively, is there an equivalent to the .begin() that works for both data structures?  The problem I have is that the 2D iterator concept implemented by ublas::matrix is inconsistent with that implemented by multi_array.<br /><br />Thanks,<br />Jesse