Re: [boost] Suggested coding guidelines

From: Jeff Paquette (paquette_at_[hidden])
Date: 2001-07-03 12:14:24

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Abrahams" <david.abrahams_at_[hidden]>
To: <boost_at_[hidden]>
Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2001 12:50 PM
Subject: Re: [boost] Suggested coding guidelines

>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jeff Paquette" <paquette_at_[hidden]>
>
> > Include guards can and are also used to prevent the header from being
> > reparsed (as suggested by Lakos). As such, it (IMHO) would be better if
> the
> > guard referenced the file name.
> >
> > I'd rather write:
> >
> > #if !defined(BOOST_XXX)
> > #include "boost/xxx"
> > #endif
> >
> > than
> >
> > #if !defined("68C2D2A0-6FD1-11d5-8F0C-00105AC8B6E1")
> > #include "boost/xxx"
> > #endif
>
> This practice is unreliable with most headers. For example, you can't do
> that with your system headers if you're writing portable code. Most
standard
> and 3rd party libraries don't document their #include guard conventions,
so
> you have to look inside the header to determine what guard they used --
and
> there's no guarantee they won't change it.

The argument is not about standard headers, is it? How many of us do that?

> We could of course establish such a convention with boost headers, but I
am
> unconvinced of the benefits.
>
> Finally, many modern compilers have learned to recognize #include guards
> such that this functionality is automated and you get zero benefit from
> cluttering files with such checks.

Interesting! Could you cite some examples? MSVC's "#pragma once" doesn't
count.