Re: Meyers effective C++, templates, np-complete

On Apr 15, 4:22 am, Todd Mars <tamn...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Does this mean that the use of templates can cause the compile to
> execute for an infinite loop or near infinite loop?

Yes. Since templates form a Turing-complete meta-language inside C++
it follows that you can make a template meta-program that runs
forever. While traditional C/C++ programming allows you to express a
computation in the form of a binary executable on a computer,
templates allow you to express how that program is constructed; which
itself is a computation of course. The former executes at run-time in
the resulting binary executable, the latter (i.e. template
instantiation) executes at compile-time inside your compiler. In a
real sense, the compiler is the execution platform for a C++ template
meta-program.

Regards,
Vidar Hasfjord


-- 
      [ See http://www.gotw.ca/resources/clcm.htm
for info about ]
      [ comp.lang.c++.moderated.    First time posters: Do this! ]