Re: [boost] toward a more modular boost (was: [Review] xpressive)

From: Jeff Garland (jeff_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-09-24 10:42:54

On Sat, 24 Sep 2005 13:57:07 +0200, bjorn wrote
> On Thursday 22 September 2005 16:24, Jeff Garland wrote:
> > On Wed, 21 Sep 2005 22:41:32 -0700, Eric Niebler wrote
> >
> > > (And for the record, I don't find boost overwhelming either.)
> >
> > I don't either.  When I compare Boost to the available JAVA libraries the
> > state of C++ is still disappointing.  In my mind we have a lot of catching
> > up to get C++ library support to the point where 'language choice' is
> > driven by a 'lack of libraries'.  Or put another way, people that have good
> > reason to implement in C++ shouldn't need to 'suffer' from the lack of
> > libraries.
> >
> 
> I agree with this, but to be fair I do not think it is as bad as it 
> sometimes look.  Remember that C++ has extreeme amounts of libraries 
> of all sorts.  

Numbers don't count -- it's focus.  There are maybe 5 portable GUI libraries
you could go evaluate for C++ -- in JAVA it's much simplier.  And despite the
large numbers of libraries, I think almost no-one can argue that one might use
C++ to implement a web server backend these days.  Sad because this is one of
the places I would expect C++ to have an upper hand on JAVA.

> The problem is availability.  Most of them have 
> licencences or platform dependencies that are generally unfriendly 
> to the community.  Also many are competitive, not complementary. 

I agree these are barriers.

>  This is very different from the standard library, boost, ACE/TAO, 
> Loki, and some others.  So if we compare these with what you find in 
> jdk or CSPAM, then there are two major differences.  The C++ 
> libraries are generally soving relatively low level tasks only not 

Well we can debate what's low level.  For example, consider getting stuff out
of a database 'low level', but essential to applications of all sorts. 
Certainly there are several libraries out there, with varying degrees of
standard library integration, portability, licensing, etc.  Nothing even close
to 'standard'. This is just standard stuff in JAVA, Perl, etc.

> higher level application tasks, and you have to look in many 
> different places to find them.

Yes.

> So in my view, a good start would be a C++ focused site where 
> everybody felt welcome to contribute portable solutions to the 
> community, even if they prefered to have their own site, library 
> brand, or whatever.  Kind of like Source Forge, but more focused on 
> streamlining C++ library information, quality and distribution like 
> CPAN.  

That could be useful.  Like CPAN I think you would need to be able to run a
few simple to understand commands to retrieve a new library into your library
set.  A kind of distributed bcp perhaps.

> <vision>
> If your library did not have an entry in there, nobody would find it 
> because that is where people would look. </vision>
> 
> That would only work only if it really feels like neutral ground,
>  and all library developers felt like they really did a stupid thing 
> if they did not make their entry, or somehow a third party could 
> handle that.  But it could also be made attractive by providing 
> compiler and computer platform resources available for development 
> and testing.  Providing portable C++ sources is very hard without 
> that, a situation that is very different in Perl and Java.  

No question portability is more difficult...

> Also this is a good way of pushing compiler vendors into staightening out 
> their rincles.  High visibility of cross platform regression test 
> result like in Boost is a good thing.

Agree.

Jeff