Re: Boost.Graph: user survey

From: Anne van de Graaf (A.vandeGraaf_at_[hidden])
Date: 2022-08-05 13:45:49

Hi Jeremy,

Please find below my response to your user survey. I hope you will find this helpful.

> Dear Boost.Graph users,

> I'd like to know how you use Boost.Graph. If you know someone that uses Boost.Graph but is not on this mailing list, please forward this survey to them. The purpose of this survey is to help prioritize work on the areas of Boost.Graph that will have the most benefit to the users.

> I was planning to make a very sophisticated Google Forms survey, but that is so time consuming.
> These questions should all be taken in the context of using Boost.Graph.
> - Which operating systems do you use?
RHEL 8 and Windows 10/11.
> - Which toolchains do you use?
To build our software we use Microsoft’s Visual Studio on Windows and the Intel compiler on Linux. Occasionally, we also build it using Clang and GCC with the intent to detect problems that are not reported by the Intel compiler. Furthermore, we use CMake as our build system generator and CLion as our primary IDE.
> - What is the minimum C++ standard that you require support for? (e.g. 03, 11, 14, etc)
At present we are using C++17 in production, but so far we haven’t had any difficulties with the standard that is currently being used by Boost.Graph (03?)
> Which features of Boost.Graph are you using?
It is mostly basic operations: DFS, BFS, connected components and so on. Nothing fancy here.
> - Which features do you think Boost.Graph is missing?
For how we use Boost.Graph now, what is provided is sufficient.
> - What are the biggest problems with using Boost.Graph?
We find the documentation not particularly easy to read or search. In particular for users who haven’t used Boost.Graph before, we would say the learning curve is quite steep.
> Purely out of curiosity:
> - What do you use it for?
We have several usages for it. For instance, we have a graph to keep track of collision detection results (in terms of model parts that clash). We sometimes also use it to capture the boundary representation (B-rep) of model parts (in terms of bodies, shells, loops, faces, edges, … and how these relate to each other).
> - If you use it in business (or research), how critical is it?
Since we use it in some core components (e.g. collision detection), it is quite critical to us.
> Thanks!

> Jeremy