Re: [boost] [Concept checking] Re: BCCL : Serialization Concept

From: Matthias Troyer (troyer_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-12-29 11:42:39

On Dec 29, 2005, at 4:31 PM, Douglas Gregor wrote:

>
> On Dec 23, 2005, at 12:10 AM, nitin motgi wrote:
>> Is there something in the pipeline for BCCL to validate the
>> serialization
>> concept.
>
> I don't know of anyone planning to do this, but it would be a great
> addition to the concept checking library.

The serialization concept might be a bit harder to validate than it  
seems initially, since there are various ways how serialization can  
be implemented. The ways that come to my mind (skipping over types  
directly supported by the library):

- a serialize member function
- a serialize free function
- load_construct_data and save_construct_data functions for types  
without a default constructor, or types containing reference members
- a save_override or load_override function in the archive class

Before working on this, it would be best to formalize the concepts.  
Robert has recently improved the archive concepts, and they could be  
taken as a starting point for concept checking on archives. The  
formal concepts for serializable types are, have far as I know, not  
been sufficiently formalized yet.

Matthias