Re: [boost] Pondering Futures

Subject: Re: [boost] Pondering Futures
From: Johan Torp (johan.torp_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-01-10 07:05:39

Tom Brinkman-2 wrote:
> 
> Is it more prudent to wait to find out what the c++ standards committe
> is going to do first, before adding a
> possibly incompatible version of the futures library to boost?
> 

It would certainly be very unfortunate if the two implementations proved
incompatible. OTOH, standardizing a library without having an existing well
tested implementation is quite risky (look at std::string).

In my understanding the C++ committee has very limited resources. I have no
doubts that the committee members are very skilled and experienced
programmers but there probably hasn't more than a few people involved in
designing std.futures. A boost review and library can give them valuable
feedback, that's the whole point of boost. Even though the experience from
boost.futures might arrive too late to change the std.futures proposal it
might allow them to remove std.futures and add it later on.

I am personally very worried that Anthony's implementation has been too
rushed and has had too much focus on being applicable to thread pools. See
my review for more details.

Tom Brinkman-2 wrote:
> 
> One could ask, if Anthony's submission is approved by the c++
> standards committe, what is the point
> of adding a "futures" library to boost as well?
> 

Another important point is that a boost library can be available years
sooner than widespread C++ standard implementations will.

Best Regards, Johan Torp
www.johantorp.com
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