Re: [boost] Re: lexical_cast with default value

From: Dave Dribin (dave-ml_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-05-02 12:08:29

On May 1, 2005, at 1:56 PM, Kevlin Henney wrote:
> This issue of providing a default value in case of failure was 
> discussed in the early days of lexical_cast, but not included. In 
> fact, if you go back far enough, opting for the default or zero 
> constructed value of the target rather than throwing an exception was 
> the original behaviour.
>
> However, the accommodation of an additional argument was not included 
> in lexical_cast in part for the simple reason that it ceases to look 
> like a cast and in part because once you start down that road there 
> are a number of additional arguments and options that you might want 
> that are "reasonable". It was felt that much of this would be better 
> off in a general conversions library that had no pretensions to being 
> cast-like.

I agree that the default behavior should throw an exception.  It just 
seems silly to create a whole new library that could be done in an 
existing one with about 5 lines of code.  And I'd prefer a 
multi-argument cast-like function than include yet *another* 3rd party 
library with my application.  Anyhow, I have an idea or two as 
alternatives.  If you're interested, lemme know, otherwise I'll drop 
the whole idea. :)

-Dave