Re: [boost] Re: New New Callbacks Uploaded

From: Kevlin Henney (kevlin_at_[hidden])
Date: 2000-12-01 05:12:06

In message <v03110702b64c92d38729@[153.32.222.4]>, Jesse Jones
<jejones_at_[hidden]> writes
>Callback doesn't mean event notification to me or, I think, many people. It
>means deferred function call which is exactly exactly the concept we're
>addressing.

Yes, the meaning of deferred call is the original one, but I have
noticed a slow shift towards more specialised use in recent years, eg

http://foldoc.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?query=callback

I don't know how much of the specialisation in vocab is related to the
rise of event-driven architectures, but in common use it is no longer as
general or unambiguous as it used to be. For STL function objects, I
note that many users do not immediately think of them as callbacks
although, strictly speaking, they are.

So, I think that the use of the term callback is not as clear as you
might have hoped, and we should -- as library authors -- be aware of and
sensitive to that.

Kevlin
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