FW: RE: [c++-pthreads] Re: I'm Lost

[Alexander Terekhov <terekhov@xxxxxx>]

< Foward Quoted >

"Meredith, Alisdair" <Alisdair.Meredith@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> schrieb am 27.07.05 13:59:12:
> 
> [Sorry for personal email, I seem to have lost my list subscription - could you forward this onto the main list too please?]
> 
> The problem as I see it is that we have 2 distinct communities of programmers, with a small intersection - Posix thread users and C++ users.
> 
> The C++ community addresses a wide variety of problem domains and deals with many users who never need Posix cancellation - indeed may never run on any Posix system.
> 
> Likewise, many Posix threaders may code in C or other posix-friendly lanuages without worrying about C++.  The posix-cancellation rules were developed for this set of customers.
> 
> C++ has very clear resource acquisition/release semantics through object construction/destruction that apply across its broad spectrum of users.  This is a fundamental, invioble rule of the language.
> 
> What I am reading here is that this large group of users now need to be aware of some quite complicated posix-specific semantics to understand when and why their guarantees will not hold, and learn some as-yet unclear new fundamental technique to wrap resources in any 'portable' code they wish to publish.
> 
> Quite simply, I believe that is far too great a burden for the casual C++ user.  They are already struggling under the burden of a complicated language without us expecting them to understand intricacies of thread safety and lifetimes.
> 
> The people actively working in the posix/C++ subset are much more familiar with these complex issues, and I believe the burden is on them to find a compromise that will not impact on the non-expert user who is NOT using this combination.  I do not pretend this is an easy task though ;¬)
> 
> AlisdairM
> [going back to lurk mode]
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: news [mailto:news@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Alexander Terekhov
> > Sent: Wednesday 27 July 2005 12:32
> > To: c++-pthreads@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: [c++-pthreads] Re: I'm Lost
> >
> >
> > Wil Evers wrote:
> > [...]
> > > I'd say it's time to face the truth, which is that POSIX cancellation
> > > semantics are incompatible with commonly established C++ coding
> > > practices.
> >
> > It's incompatible with cancel-unaware C++ code. Note that it's
> > incompatible with cancel-unaware C code as well, but that didn't
> > stop POSIX and ongoing creation of cancel-safe code in both C
> > and C++ languages. Very many tons of cancel-safe code.
> >
> > regards,
> > alexander.
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