Re: The reuse of keywords in the C++ standard

{ Corrected the double spacing. -mod }

"Moschops" <moschops@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:kKKdncs2TPrh4o3VRVnygQA@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 I note with some dismay the proposal to create a new meaning for the C
and
: C++ keyword 'auto', as described in the do***ent N1984 (part of the
: proposals for C++0X or whatever it's called now). Efforts are being
taken to
: ensure it doesn't conflict with the previous meaning of the keyword, but
why
: not simply have a whole new keyword? These guys aren't stupid, so I
assume
: there must be a good reason.

Given the huge existing base of C code, every newly introduced alphabetic
keyword may break many existing projects.
For an illustration of how delicate this gets:
   http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg21/docs/papers/2006/n2105.html

New keywords have to either be uniquely ***bersome, or break existing
code.
It is therefore appealing to "recycle" old keywords that have become
useless nowadays, or to overload their meaning.
[ C# took its own approach, by creating context-sensitive keywords... ]

Initially the new use of "auto" was to remain backwards-compatible
  (but I'm not sure if this will hold in the end).


Regards -Ivan

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