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From: Deane Yang (deane_yang_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-05-18 10:40:09


Lassi A.Tuura wrote:
>> I have nothing against physicists or other C++ programmers who find
>> templates and boost way too obscure or complex to use and choose to
>> stick with older techniques that they know how to use effectively.
>> [...] But what I like about boost a lot is that it adheres relatively
>> well to a core set of principles and idioms that fit very well with my
>> programming style. [...] I am against "polluting" boost with code that
>> compromises these principles, because it would re-introduce
>> difficulties that boost helps me avoid.
>
>
> Do I read you correctly that you actually say templates are an essential
> part to every design in boost? I must admit such an approach would
> never occur to me, I have always thought one picks a technique
> applicable to the problem, and sometimes it's the 100-year old version
> that does the best job. "One hammer doesn't fit all screws" they say :)
>

I'm sorry for not being clear. Not every part of boost uses templates,
but templates are used quite extensively in boost. I think boost does
try to use the best technique applicable to each problem. For the vast
majority of the problems addressed by boost, templates play a crucial
role. Before I found boost, I was starting to discover the power of
templates in my own programming, and I was very happy to find a group of
real C++ programmers (unlike me) who already understood this better than
me, had developed libraries I needed, and made them far more bulletproof
than I am capable of. If boost had done all of this without templates, I
would have been just as happy, but, as it happens, templates do provide
a crucial tool.


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