Re: [boost] Candidate for 1.66.1, if there is one

Subject: Re: [boost] Candidate for 1.66.1, if there is one
From: Robert Ramey (ramey_at_[hidden])
Date: 2017-12-24 18:33:16

On 12/24/17 9:07 AM, Seth via Boost wrote:
> On 24-12-17 18:04, Peter Dimov via Boost wrote:
>> This leads me to wonder if serialization is compatible across
>> platforms and if it is *supposed *to be compatible across platforms.
>> Is this a bug?? Shouldn't binary serialization be the same size on
>> every platform, assuming platform-specific types are not used?
> 
> That's documented
> http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/1_66_0/libs/serialization/doc/todo.html#portablebinaryarchives
> 
> Anyways, there's EOS Portable Archive https://epa.codeplex.com/

This is a well done package which I believe was inspired by the portable 
binary archive example in the serialization library. I made efforts 
toward integrating this into the current serialization package.  But it 
wasn't a trivial fit so I had to set it aside... for now.

But I'm convinced that the serialization library needs a couple of 
enhancements:

a) portable_binary_archive equivalent to EOS above
b) JSON archive

I've shied away from promoting portable_binary_archive to "official 
status" as the main issue was dealing with floating point in a portable 
way.  This is a lot trickier than first meets the eye.  But fortunately 
or unfortunately, I've found myself getting involved with this at a low 
level so I might make moves in this direction.

Lately, I've received more PRS form interested parties.  This has 
inspired me to invest a little more effort in evolving the library 
relevant at least until the standards committee were to design and 
implement their official version.

Robert Ramey