Re: [boost] [filesystem] Change "remove" function's return to void?

From: David Abrahams (dave_at_[hidden])
Date: 2008-07-01 10:40:47

Beman Dawes wrote:
> The remove(p) function is currently specified to return a bool with a
> value of exist(p) before the post-condition is established. The
> post-condition is !exists(p).

You can't really guarantee that, can you?  Can't some other process
sneak in and re-create p before remove returns?

> The original thought in providing this was that the return value might
> be useful and would cost nothing.
> 
> It turns out that providing this return value does have several costs:
> 
> * A call to exists() could be omitted if the actual system removal call
> succeeds. exists() is surprisingly expensive on some operating systems.
> 
> * It makes the remove() function less reliable in that it introduces a
> potential race condition.
> 
> * It makes flow of control more complex (and thus harder to test) for
> some implementations.
> 
> Thus I'd like to change the return to void. Although that will break
> some code, the breakage will result in a noisy compile-time error that
> is easy to fix by inserting a call to exits() before the call to remove().
> 
> Comments?

Sounds like you're making the right choice here.

-- 
Dave Abrahams
BoostPro Computing
http://www.boostpro.com