Robert Ramey <ramey <at> rrsd.com> writes:
But getting back to the original problem - really the most important thing here is that the default tracking level should be unaffected by compile-time instantiation. As long as I know what the default is, and that it won't change under my feet, then I would be OK with that.
Would that be feasible to implement?
Just specify your own setting with BOOST_CLASS_TRACKING(mytype, track_always) or BOOST_CLASS_TRACKING(mytype, track_never) for your own classes.
If this is too much - then you could tweak the "tracking.hpp" file so that the default is "track_always" or "track_never" or whatever.
OK, I think we can wrap this up then... My understanding now is : ----------------------------------------- * If one program writes archives like this: ar & vec; // vec is a std::vector<char> , it is then impossible to reliably load that archive in another program, unless one is aware of the entire compile-time content of the first program. * When one writes code like this: ar << pVec; // pVec is a vector<char> * , it has the compile-time side effect of silently changing the archive format for *all* archives produced by that program, that happen to include a vector<char>. Making matters worse, the archive format change is compatibility- breaking. ----------------------------------------- IMHO, this is a rather fragile state of affairs, but it's your call and I won't argue it further. I'll go with the workaround, and document to users of my library, that if they use B.Ser. to serialize vector<char> (and presumably a number of other types?), they must always write BOOST_CLASS_TRACKING(vector<char>, track_never) , and that failure to do so is likely to trigger silent deserialization errors in other programs. Regards, Jarl.