Re: [Boost-users] Re: interest in a glob_iterator? (directory_iterator with regex)

From: Rich Johnson (rjohnson_at_[hidden])
Date: 2004-01-15 15:51:41

On Thursday, January 15, 2004, at 09:40 AM, Jim.Hyslop wrote:

> Angus Leeming [mailto:angus.leeming_at_[hidden]] wrote:
>> Jeff Flinn wrote:
>>> And a more descriptive, less jargon-ish name.
>>
>> Why? Rich is proposing something that would iterate over the files
>> returned by the unix 'glob' function.
> As much as you might hate to admit it, you must recognize that the 
> world
> does not revolve around UNIX (and before anyone claims otherwise, nor 
> does
> the world revolve around Windows).
Of course not....it revolves around the Mac :-) (whoops, better duck 
and cover)

>
> To my knowledge, "glob" is not a standard computer term, nor a 
> standard C++
> term, it is a standard UNIX term. Now, I could be wrong, but my
> understanding of the ISO standardization process is make everything
> platform-independent (and keep in mind that one of the original goals 
> of
> Boost was to be included in the Standard). The *concept* of the "glob" 
> is
> pretty much platform independent, but the term is not, so it should 
> have (to
> paraphrase Jeff) a more descriptive, less platform-specific name.
>
Oh, I'll confess that I thought "glob()" was already part of the POSIX 
standard;
but I'll admit I didn't look to be sure.

Anyway, the point is taken.  To rephrase Russell's comment:
          " I don't care what it's called as long as I have its 
function!"

Would  a better name be "wildcard_iterator"?  
filtered_directory_iterator?
perhaps "filename_iterator"?  Can anyone offer other suggestions?

And while we're on the subject of platform/environment independence:
What should be the set of meta-characters?  The initial implementation
supports  csh/bash style  "*", "?", "[ab-z]", "[^ab-z]", and  "{a,b}".  
Should
the set be expanded?  restricted?

--rich