From -1659027757764583238 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: f78e5,74637d148a591f02 X-Google-Attributes: gidf78e5,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-03-27 16:40:56 PST Path: supernews.google.com!sn-xit-02!supernews.com!feed1.uncensored-news.com!news.alt.net!comp-std-cpp-robomod!not-for-mail From: James Dennett Newsgroups: comp.std.c++ Subject: Re: Proposal: two real uses for the "auto" keyword Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 18:37:56 CST Organization: Altopia Corp. - Usenet Access - http://www.altopia.com Lines: 38 Approved: Fergus Henderson , moderator of comp.std.c++ Message-ID: <3AC0958B.62091812@acm.org> References: <052201c0b4ab$603e8050$0500a8c0@dragonsys.com> <99l3nf$7n0$1@news-int.gatech.edu> <+zJqQ9Afowv6Ews1@ntlworld.com> <3ABF4E68.14646D4E@acm.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Return-Path: X-Authentication-Warning: mulga.cs.mu.OZ.AU: fjh set sender to devnull@stump.algebra.com using -f X-Robomod: STUMP, ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov) Resent-From: fjh@cs.mu.OZ.AU Resent-Message-Id: <200103272300.JAA13703@hg.cs.mu.oz.au> X-NNTP-Posting-Host: jamesd.demon.co.uk:194.222.230.41 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 985699724 nnrp-08:8241 NO-IDENT jamesd.demon.co.uk:194.222.230.41 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net X-Accept-Language: en Resent-Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:00:44 +1000 Resent-To: fjh+csc-submit@cs.mu.OZ.AU Xref: supernews.google.com comp.std.c++:4044 Francis Glassborow wrote: > > In article <3ABF4E68.14646D4E@acm.org>, James Dennett > writes > >Francis Glassborow wrote: > >> > >> In article <99l3nf$7n0$1@news-int.gatech.edu>, Brian McNamara! > >> writes > >> >(As an aside, I am curious why function declarations are even allowed > >> >inside functions.) > >> > >> Almost certainly for compatibility with C. > > > >Would it be sensible to consider deprecating this feature, > >or removing it altogether? It seems to give no significant > >benefit, and plenty of pain. > > I think the pain would still be there unless you want to deprecate > member function declarations in classes:) How so? It's not legal to initialize non-static data members of classes, so there's no chance of confusing an initialized data member with a method declaration. The only initializations we allow in class definitions are for integral types, IIRC. As far as I can see, there's no possibility of the problematic ambiguity arising inside a class definition. If I'm wrong, I'm sure you (or another language lawyer ;) will detail why. -- James Dennett --- [ comp.std.c++ is moderated. To submit articles, try just posting with ] [ your news-reader. If that fails, use mailto:std-c++@ncar.ucar.edu ] [ --- Please see the FAQ before posting. --- ] [ FAQ: http://www.research.att.com/~austern/csc/faq.html ]