On Thu, 10 Feb 2011 10:58:25 +0200, Peter Alexander
<peter.alexander...@gmail.com> wrote:
On 10/02/11 8:19 AM, Don wrote:
Andrei once stated a worthy goal: as far as possible, const should be
opt-in: it should be possible to code without requiring const on
everything.
opEquals() is in conflict with this, since it is a member function of
Object.
(1) If it is a const member function, then it will have a viral effect
on all objects -- any function called by opEquals will have to be marked
const.
(2) If it is not const, then const objects cannot be compared!
Currently, it's not const, but the problem isn't visible because of
compiler bug 5080. (Same problem applies to opCmp).
How will we break this dilemma?
It's not possible. You need logical const to make const opt-in. This has
been argued many times by several people.
There might be a way involving something like inout attribute for
functions.
It would solve these problems and wouldn't intrude those that don't care
constness.
