Re: [boost] [Review] The review of the Boost.Logging library starts today, November 7th

From: Eelis van der Weegen (gmane_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-11-12 15:28:55

I have a couple of design questions:

1. What is the fundamental reason that logs cannot be declared/defined with 
something as simple as  boost::logging::log mylog ("mylog");  ? What 
special needs do you have that rule out this approach? (I took a brief look 
at the source code, got a vague idea what you were trying to accomplish, 
and have some ideas about how the same may be accomplished without 
resorting to macro's, but would like to hear your explanation and reasoning 
first.)

2. I am very skeptical about logs having both a C++ identifier and a string 
name. The documentation argues that the string names bring "extreme 
flexibility" in the following two ways:

a: External identification

While I agree that external identification may sometimes be useful to some 
users, is it really necessary to integrate it into the library? Would the 
users who require such functionality not be able to simply use something 
like a   std::map<std::string, log *>  ?

b: Log hierarchies

I do not question the usefulness of log hierarchies, but am not convinced 
that string names (and wildcard queries) are the best way to implement them.

It seems to me that all that is needed to be able to form hierarchies of 
logs, is a way to express parent->child relationships between two logs. 
Indeed, something as simple as  parent_log.append_child(child_log);  should 
suffice.

Wildcarded queries would simply become logs (or some sort of log-proxies) 
by themselves, that the user must manually connect to the desired sink logs.

While this approach is slightly more cumbersome, I feel that getting rid of 
all the string name cruft is definitely a big win.

What are your feelings about this?

Regards,

Eelis