Re: [boost] Reflection Framework [was Serialization and Reflection]

From: William E. Kempf (wekempf_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-12-19 09:46:53

David Abrahams said:
> "craigp_at_[hidden]" <craigp_at_[hidden]> writes:
>
>>> I'm very interested in having a reflection library available, but I
>>> can't afford any time to helping with the work, sorry.  However, I'd
>>> suggest you take into consideration XTI, which is an idea for
>>> reflection in C++ from Bjarne Stroustrup (there's several links to
>>> this on the web, one of which is
>>> http://www.klid.dk/arrangementer/XTI_kbh.pdf, do a Google search for
>>> the others).  I think his work on it has stagnated, at least from
>>> some things I've heard from others, which is unfortunate.  But I
>>> think his work would be a great place to start from for a Boost
>>> reflection framework.
>>
>> I'm definitely looking into this. After educating myself, I was
>> planning on contacting BS about the current status of his project. If
>> anyone happens to know more information, or is in a position to find
>> out more, please do so and/or let me know. TIA.
>
> FWIW, I don't think it would be smart to put *too* many eggs in this
> basket.  Because XTI is based on debug symbol information, it is
> neccessarily limited in certain ways that a full-compiler-based
> solution is not.  For example, I'm fairly certain that some details
> unneccessary for debugging like access control
> (public/private/protected) are dropped.

That sounds reasonable to me, be XTI does have a lot of nice interface
designs that could still be the starting point for a Boost effort.

William E. Kempf