RFC: JEP JDK-8208089: Implement C++14 Language Features (original) (raw)

Thomas Stüfe thomas.stuefe at gmail.com
Mon Oct 8 19:42:47 UTC 2018

Hi Kim, On Mon, Oct 8, 2018 at 8:32 PM Kim Barrett <kim.barrett at oracle.com> wrote:

> On Oct 8, 2018, at 6:48 AM, Thomas Stüfe <thomas.stuefe at gmail.com> wrote: > > Hi Kim, > > is this JEP only about C++14 features or shall we discuss older > features too? The reason I am asking is that I would like us to > officially endorse namespaces. Not inline namespaces, just plain old > namespaces. I would like to keep this JEP focused on C++11/14 usage. However, it presently describes a process for recording and updating HotSpot usage. I think that process is pretty close to the de facto process, which is rarely used successfully because it's not written down anywhere. We could extract that part of the JEP out, formalize, discuss, agree, and record it. Then you could propose a change and there would be a process for dealing with the proposal, rather than having it slide into oblivion because we don't know how to proceed. And the JEP could be made a bit smaller because it could just refer to that process.

Yes, I would like that. It would be really good to have a process in place to preserve and actually live a consensus about what features we use.

We have the Hotspot Style Guide, but we let it become woefully outdated in the face of new developments. I always smile when I read the "Be sparing with templates." remark - that ship has sailed long ago.

A small remark to the text of your JEP:

"As a rule of thumb, permitting features which simplify writing, and especially reading, code should be encouraged."

I would like to add to that that simplifying build error analysis should also be a goal. That directly influences programmer productivity. We had some cases in the recent past where we spent a lot of time scratching our heads over walls of template related compiler errors.

(not sure how to reach this goal though, since this seems to be a problem inherent in using C++ templates).

Best Regards, Thomas

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