Kim Barrett wrote:
At 11:58 PM -0400 8/22/09, Edward Diener wrote:
This does not explain the practical purpose of multimethods. I know what virtual functions are, of course. What in multimethods improves on the polymorphic capabilities of virtual functions that make them a practical choice for use over normal polymorphism.
The previously referenced paper (http://research.att.com/~bs/multimethods.pdf) contains rationale discussion, including several well chosen examples where multiple dispatch can be beneficial.
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