I'm trying to really understand the limits of what can be done in C++ with Boost.Function and Boost.Lambda by implementing a number of functional programming idioms in C++. I've done a few fairly complicated things, but seem to have run into a problem with a really basic one. I just want to do a partial application on some basic operands. This is what I'm trying to do: boost::function< int( int ) > increment( boost::lambda::_1 + 1 ); This gives an error that operator + isn't defined for the Boost placeholder type. If I add the following it works: template< typename V > V add( V l, V r ) { return l + r; } template< typename S > boost::function< S ( S ) > operator +( const boost::lambda::placeholder1_type, S s ) { return boost::lambda::bind( add< S >, boost::lambda::_1, s ); } I guess there's a huge number of these that could (should?) be added. Is this an oversight, or am I doing things with the library that I'm not meant to do? I'm using MSVC 7.1 and Boost 1.34.0 release candidate. K