Re: [boost] Re: Re: Comeau general comments

From: David Abrahams (david.abrahams_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-07-10 17:29:04

From: "Greg Comeau" <comeau_at_[hidden]>

> David Abrahams <boost_at_[hidden]> wrote:

> >Boost doesn't require any special support from compilers to get #include
> >directories into the command-line, but if you want to spend resources on
> >that I guess I can't stop you.
>
> The capability mentioned won't require it either, just provide
> another way of achieving it.
>
> There's a substantial number of people who want it this way
> (we know from other non-boost work, but also from specific requests
> we've gotten for boost -- it's one of the reasons I'm here)
> and also people who need it this way (they are on small systems, etc).
> As well, it gives some novices a way of getting up to speed
> immediately, who would otherwise be complete out of the picture
> (I hope general boost philosophy is to support novices.)

Whenever practical. I just wonder if this actually makes anything easier.
Now there are two separate command-line options which do the same thing.
Sounds confusing.

> >I do worry a little that people who have
> >trouble getting your "boost-specific" feature to work will come to us
> >instead of you for support, but that's a minor issue.
>
> I would think said machinery would result in less such requests.
> BTW, we already have the opposite (people come to us for
> boost-specific support).  It would therefore make sense, to me,
> that we should strive to accomodate "both" (actually, I suspect
> there is more than 2 groups of people) sides, and where that
> is not possible, work out a compromise.  I feel this
> should be the case even w/o the above feature.

Fine with me.

> >An area you might
> >look at, if you're interested in supporting boost well,
> >is automatically generating specializations for some of
> >the type traits library templates, such as has_trivial_destructor<>.
>
> I have multi-motivations for being here.   Getting feedback
> such as this suggestion is one of them.   I would be glad
> to see a more complete list like this suggestion.

See http://www.boost.org/libs/type_traits/index.htm#compiler

-Dave