Re: [boost] Formal Review Request: Boost.String.Convert

Subject: Re: [boost] Formal Review Request: Boost.String.Convert
From: Andrey Semashev (andrey.semashev_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-02-17 15:26:31

Emil Dotchevski wrote:

>> The outcome was that to_string/from_string are not verbs, are slightly
>> longer than convert and duplicate the namespace name; to/from are
>> meaningless without the surrounding namespace name, which may be omitted or
>> mangled with aliases.
> 
> Are you saying that
> 
> boost::string::to(x)
> 
> reads better than
> 
> boost::to_string(x)?

<sigh> Here we go again...

They both are bad, IMO. I'm against polluting the boost namespace, so 
boost::some_namespace::to_string(x) is better, but the submission author 
and some others didn't like it either. The consensus was 
boost::string::convert, if I'm not missing anything.

>> The convert function will eventually convert different things to strings and
>> vice versa.
> 
> You can convert different things to string using to_string. You can
> convert different things from strings using from_string.
> 
> My question is, what is the motivation for the convert function?
> What's the use case for it that doesn't work with
> to_string/from_string?

There isn't any particular case for using the "convert" naming. As there 
isn't one for "to_string/from_string".