Re: [boost] Koenig lookup, names in std:: - Summary

From: David Abrahams (abrahams_at_[hidden])
Date: 2001-01-27 18:29:12

----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Dimov" <pdimov_at_[hidden]>

> Surprisingly few people
> distinguish overloads from specializations, and adding partial
> specializations is not going to help. :-)

Actually, I think it /will/ help.

> On the other hand, people
> routinely call overloads "partial specializations" without knowing that
this
> thing doesn't exist and use this lack of knowledge as an excuse to add to
> std::, so perhaps the feature does belong to C++, after all. Many people
are
> expecting it to be in the language and are surprised when they don't find
> it.

The main reason people confuse partial specialization with overloaded
template functions selected through partial ordering is that they serve
analogous purposes in two different domains. If we had partial
specialization of function templates, there would be two distinct but
similar mechanisms in the domain of functions (yes, this has /many/
downsides), which might cause people to recognize that one mechanism is the
same as the one at work in the domain of classes.

-Dave