Re: [boost] Permanently retire VC++ 6?

From: David Abrahams (dave_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-12-06 11:09:27

Brian Allison <brian_at_[hidden]> writes:

> But how would it change anything?  We don't "guarantee" anything
> today, and I'm pretty sure we won't guarantee anything a year from now
> either.
>
>    I  wasn't  suggesting  any  guarantees be put forth; that's why I used
>    quotes  around 'guaranteed'. Perhaps it would have been less imprecise
>    if I had said:
>       If  only  highly  conformant  compilers  were in the 1st category -
>    presuming  such a category had sufficient usefulness to the developers
>    to  warrant  the  concept  of categorization - then the users of Boost
>    could  be  less  likely  to miss the fact that the only obligation the
>    developers  assigned  to  themselves was attempting to write compliant
>    code which a conforming compiler would therefore accept.
>      Then the developers could concentrate on the expressing the thoughts
>    into  code  instead  of concerning themselves to any great degree with
>    non-conformant platforms.
>      Which would then make it more obvious to the non-developers that the
>    burden  of  non-conformant compilers is intrinsically on the shoulders
>    of those who choose the non-conformant compilers.
>       Sorry  if  that's  too  verbose, I'm under significant workload and
>    didn't  take  much  time on the explanation. Also, I didn't think that
>    the  most  concise  message  was  the  empty  set  - aplogies if I was
>    mistaken.

The problem is that as you make it more precise, you also make it
clear that it's not very meaningful.  Even most compilers we'd
consider to be "quite conformant" are not without their issues.  So,
I'd like to see some way of formulating this so that we can all
understand what it really means for:

  users
  library developers
  testers
  (anyone I left out?)

-- 
Dave Abrahams
Boost Consulting
www.boost-consulting.com