Re: [boost] Interfaces Library, a macro less implementation

From: Jonathan Turkanis (technews_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-06-30 11:51:08

Joel de Guzman wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I like the idea behind the Interfaces Library:
>>      http://www.kangaroologic.com/interfaces/
>>
>> I need one now. I dislike the macro-based Interface
>> Definition Language, however. I find it utterly ugly
>> especially because interfaces should be immediately
>> readable. IMO, the macro-based IDL is not.

I agree that the current macro-based IDL is hard to read. There have been some
good suggestion on this about improving it, however. Have you looked at the
template-based IDL:  http://tinyurl.com/6w59y? I haven't implemented it yet, but
it's at the top of my list.

I've also been looking for a way to redesign the protocol so that hand-written
interfaces will be resonable intelligible, but I haven't had much luck; it looks
like you may have solved this.

>> Here's another take (prototype) at a macro less
>> implementation of the interfaces (see attached).
>> Tested on VC7.1, g++ and Comeau. The biggest advantage
>> is that the same C++ member function interface syntax
>> is retained. This makes it very easy to understand and
>> even allows documentation extraction tools like Doxygen
>> to work as usual. A disadvantage is that there is some
>> unavoidable redundancy-- a lesser price to pay, IMO.

It looks very promising! I'll won't have a chance to examine it in detail until
at least tomorrow.

Jonathan