Re: Nested variable declarations using the same name

siliconmunky@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:
> Hi, I was wondering what is the point of the language sup****ting
> nested variable declarations of the same name?
> 
> For example:
> 
> int a = 0;
> 
> if( some_bool )
> {
>      int a = 5;
>      ...
> }
> 
> cout << a;  //this outputs 0
> 
> 
> I can't think of a reason why this would be sup****ted, and I feel the
> compiler should throw a warning. So, is there a good useful reason to
> allow this?
> 
That is because such nesting may in fact be a consequence of including a
third party library. Just because that library elects to add a new
global variable in its next release should not cause me to have to
rewrite my code.

Please also note that in fact the two definitions above do NOT define
exactly the same name because the compiler always includes scope so the
first one is actually ::a

Now I would have some sympathy if the case were:

void foo{}{
   int i(0);
   {
     int i(1);
//do something
    }
// do something else
}

However trying to write rules for such special cases often results in
fragile code. So we just resort to trusting the programmer while
protecting her from problems created by other programmers.

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