From: Edward Diener (eddielee_at_[hidden])
Date: 2006-06-08 23:27:10
Peter Dimov wrote:
> Edward Diener wrote:
>
>> Boost really needs a table which specifically says, for any given
>> release in the future, which compilers are supported for which
>> libraries. Anything short of that is confusing and will cause end user
>> problems.
>
> How would we know what to put in the table?
If you, the author of Boost libraries, do not know what compilers work
correctly with your libraries, imagine how the user of one of your
libraries feels when he tries to determine whether his compiler will
work with your library. Really, Peter, I find it disingenuous that you
believe it is not your responsibility to know or document what compilers
work with your library. It is equivalent to a library author saying that
his implementation may or may not work with a user's particular
compiler, but the end user can figure it out somehow nonetheless. That
is really some attitude for Boost developers to take. If you said that
you did not know whether a compiler worked with your libraries because
you did not have that compiler/platform, that is understandable, but if
I were a library implementor I would assume it was my responsibility to
find out one way or another, at least among the compilers which are
popular and often used by developers on the platform(s) I supported.
> I do what I can to support
> whatever is being regression tested and/or whatever is being bug-reported
> against. Many of these are platforms that I never use.
That is partially understandable. See above.
>
> The regression test matrix is the only reliable place that shows what works.
The regression test matrix appears to be tests by different testers of
different libraries, and certainly not of all librariews which may or
may not work for a particular compiler which Boost supports in some way.
I have rarely been able to make sense of what actually does work with
what compiler. Is this a failing of mine to understand the matrix ? Is
the matrix really a complete record of all Boost supported compilers and
their tests against all libraries which ostensibly support a compiler ?
What if there is no regression test of a particular compiler against a
particular library ? Does that mean that the library does not support
the compiler, or might it mean that nobody has submitted a test of that
library with that compiler ? These are all serious questions I am asking
because from what I see the regression tests do not absolutely answer
what compilers work with the different Boost libraries. But maybe I am
just missing the ability to interpret the regression tests correctly as
an absolute indication of which Boost support compilers work with which
libraries.