Re: [boost] Naming convention of iterated binary operation

On May 2, 2016 5:30:40 AM EDT, Jeremy Murphy wrote:

On 2 May 2016 at 18:20, Rob Stewart wrote:

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On May 1, 2016 11:25:39 PM EDT, Jeremy Murphy < jeremy.william.murphy@gmail.com> wrote:

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For example, Boost.Functional/Hash has an iterated hash() called hash_range(). I don't mind the "_range" suffix but I prefer the "iterated_" prefix based on the mathematical definition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterated_binary_operation

The case in point is gcd() in Boost.Math: we want to provide an iterated gcd but we can't quite decide how to name it. I like the "iterated_" prefix but I would rather go with whatever might be the convention.

In C++, given overloading, it isn't necessary to use a different name

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for different arguments. Therefore, I wonder whether "gcd" is sufficient for the iterated case.

Indeed, this is an interesting point and I thought about it for some time already. My (strong) feeling is that functions with different semantics should have different names, but I don't have a formal or strong argument to support this. I know we can use the same name but it doesn't seem like a good idea apart from minimizing the number of names in a namespace.

A variadic template version with the same name makes sense to me, though.

There's some detail missing. How is your iterated GCD function different from a variadic gcd()? ___ Rob (Sent from my portable computation engine)