candidate for library, "sysutils"

From: Mark Coletti (mcoletti_at_[hidden])
Date: 2001-03-27 13:53:45

>    Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 10:29:17 +0100
>    From: "Craig Henderson" <chenderson_at_[hidden]>
> Subject: RE: candidate for library, "sysutils"

> It must be taken into account during the design of such a library, the
> differences between OSs. For example, UNIX '/' and MS '\'. The
> description of the isabs() in the Python doc below reads "Return true if
> path is an absolute pathname (begins with a slash)." This is true on
> UNIX, but with MS absolute pathnames can begin with "C:\" or "\\" for a
> UNC path.

  Ugh.

  Does MSVC++ have dirname() / basename() implementations?  Perhaps
the easiest thing to do would be to wrap those if they exist.  That
way, any Mickeysoftisms are readily caught, even as M$ OSs change.

> From: David Abrahams [mailto:abrahams_at_[hidden]]
> Sent: 27 March 2001 03:35
> To: boost_at_[hidden]
> Subject: Re: [boost] candidate for library, "sysutils"

> Please boostify and submit!

  Will do, but it may take me a few days.  I'm doing the grad student
giving birth to thesis/full time job thing, so time is at a premium.

> Directory path manipulations are an important piece that is missing
> from the C++ standard library.

  And that functionality seems to be missing from the C standard
library; or is inconsistently available.

> I suggest a quick look at Python's os.path [url snipped] for
> functionality you may have left out.

  Looks like some useful stuff, though I'm not sure if I'm willing to
implement _all_ of that because of personal time constraints.  Should
we organize some form of implementation triage?

Cheers!

Mark
-- 
Mark Coletti | mailto:mcoletti_at_[hidden] | http://www.lychnobite.org/
	    Psychic comedians have a sixth sense of humor.