I noticed that the trunk now has corrections for pow<N> to reduce template instantiations. However, the "N=1" specialization isn't correct. The second template parameter (bool odd) should be "true," not "false." I could be mistaken that 1 is an odd number, though. :-) As it is now, the whole template would work, but would ignore the 1/false specialization and create a new 1/true specialization that just multiplies "base" by the result of 0/false. Changing 1/false to 1/true will just cause it to return "base," as desired. Note also, please, that positive_power<0,false> returns 1 when base is 0. Since 0^0 is technically undefined, the "N=0" case should probably be handled at a higher level (in power_if_positive, perhaps), and cause an error, just like negative powers of 0. If that is done, the 0/false case could be removed from positive_power.