Eric Friedman wrote:
This is used by variant to support the variant::type method. Otherwise, as Benoit explained, it is not used.
I know in the past there had been discussion about defining a BOOST_NO_RTTI macro, but I don't think this went anywhere...? If there were such a macro, the variant implementation could be changed to conditionally compile the variant::type method, etc.
Wouldn't it be cleaner to just deprecate that member function and reintroduce a freestanding version in a separate header (so the dependencies are as optional as the feature)? This takes some time, however, a fake 'typeinfo' header might serve as a short-term workaround to make code like variant compile as-is without RTTI: // unrefined and untested code for illustration only namespace std { struct RTTI_NOT_SUPPORTED; typedef RTTI_NOT_SUPPORTED type_info; } #define typeid *( ::std::type_info* )sizeof Regards, Tobias