Re: [boost] Boost.Python

From: Dan Nuffer (dnuffer_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-11-08 00:57:15

David Abrahams wrote:
> Dan Nuffer <dnuffer_at_[hidden]> writes:
>>2. Is is possible to wrap member functions which take a variable
>>number of arguments (e.g. int format(const char* fmt, ...); ) ?  I
>>tried .def("format", &OW_String::format) but that doesn't work.
> 
> 
> Not directly. Conversions from Python to C++ are "target-driven",
> meaning that we need to know the type of the C++ argument in order to
> make the conversion happen. 
> 
> There are ways you can write a function which takes an arbitrary
> number of Python objects in an argument tuple, and you can do the
> dispatching yourself.
> 
> You could also consider supporting a fixed maximum number of arguments
> by wrapping something like:
> 
> int format_dispatch(
>     char const*fmt, object a0 = object(), object a1 =
>     object()... object aN = object())
> {
>    // implementation details left up to you ;-)
> }
> 

You probably know something I don't.  I can't think of a way to do this 
without having a n^m explosion of code, where n = number of types to 
support and m = number of arguments.  Is there an good way to implement 
this?

Thanks,
Dan Nuffer