Re: [boost] Common future base class (was Re: Boost.Fiber mini-review September 4-13)

Subject: Re: [boost] Common future base class (was Re: Boost.Fiber mini-review September 4-13)
From: Giovanni Piero Deretta (gpderetta_at_[hidden])
Date: 2015-09-06 08:09:55

On Sun, Sep 6, 2015 at 1:34 AM, Vicente J. Botet Escriba
<vicente.botet_at_[hidden]> wrote:
[snip
> Giovanni, I'm all for adapting Boost.Thread to any global solution to this
> problem.
> What we need first is some one working on it, and showing that we are able
> to efficiently implement when_all/when_any for some kind of future concept.
> Then we can try to see how to make boost::future/std::future ...... models
> of this concept.
> If you have ideas on how this can work, a POC  and time, I propose you to
> work on it and propose such a library to Boost.
> I don't believe it is fair to add a link to a ongoing work implementation
> during the review of a library having a different scope.

hum, futures are in scope of a library that reimplements the c++11
thread facilities on top of user space threads. My primary concern is
that I wouldn't want to see in boost a proliferation of futures all
slightly different and incompatible with each other. This being the
second review in a row for a library that comes with its own futures,
I would say that my concerns are well founded.

To be clear, I'm not trying to sneak in a proposal for a library of my
own: I have neither enough free time nor the permission of my employer
to contribute a library to boost. I was merely suggesting a *possible*
implementation of the interoperation protocol. My acceptance would be
conditional on the library being interoperable with boost.thread, but
not on the implementation. I would prefer that the two futures types
were physically the same or at least share part of the implementation
though.

Also, I'm not trying to get you to do the work of adding the missing
functionality to boost::thread::future. That would probably be the
responsibility of whoever is proposing a new library, but they would
need your approval, as you are the current maintainer of boost.thread.

-- gpd