Re: [boost] Determining interest: Pure imaginary number library

Subject: Re: [boost] Determining interest: Pure imaginary number library
From: Neal Becker (ndbecker2_at_[hidden])
Date: 2011-11-18 10:51:12

Vicente Botet wrote:

...
> 
> Some comments related to the interface. I will replace
> 
>     T& imag();
>     const T& imag() const;
> 
> by
> 
>     T imag() const;
> 
> As there is no reason to provide non-const access to the internal
> representation.
>  

I disagree - there is a use to provide non-const access.  Unless it happens that 
the internal representation is not obvious.

Removing non-const real() and imag() was done in std::complex, and I think that 
was a mistake.  It makes some uses really annoying (requiring hacks).  The 
reason for this, as I understand, is so a different internal rep could be used.  
And you know what?  Who does that?!?  I seriously doubt any implementation is 
not simply:

flt m_real;
flt m_imag;

Sure, you could interally use polar notation - but noone does.