[boost] Re: Boost header guidelines

From: Ed Brey (brey_at_[hidden])
Date: 1999-10-07 01:02:22

> From: John Maddock [mailto:John_Maddock_at_[hidden]]
>
> >Just a thought:
> If the problem is more one of non-standard library components than of
> missing language support, you could considering requiring the STLPort for
> using regex++ under VC6.<
>
> No it doesn't really help, it just changes the way in which fixes have to
> be applied, I get the impression that dinkumware did their best, given the
> compiler limitations, in fact I get the impression that they are deeply
> frustrated with the compilers capabilities given that they usually get the
> blaim for the non-standard library.

The dinkumware library that ships with VC6 suffers from two problems: lack of
compiler support and age.  For the former, as you stated, switching to STLPort
won't make much difference.  However, STLPort does provide a library that is
based on the C++ standard, rather than a draft.  This makes a big difference,
for instance, if you want to use std::auto_ptr (yes, it is still useful, even
in the presence of the boost smart pointers).

Also, STLPort makes use of features that have been added to VC6 since the
dinkumware version was frozen.  This makes a difference when using predicate
versions of member functions, since the dinkumware version unnecessarily hard
codes the predicates because of its out-of-date assumption that member
template functions are unsupported.