On 3 June 2010 12:30, Terry Golubiewski <tjgolubi@netins.net> wrote:
Tom wrote:
endian::cast<big_to_host>() //explicit direction endian::cast<from_litle>() //"to_host" is implicit endian::cast<to_big>() //"from_host" is implicit
Is it imporant that these names are templated? What are the advantages of this templated-tagged design over..
I also find it odd that the direction is mixed in with the endianness. I'd expect something like to_host_endian and from_host_endian, with a policy type for the endianness. (Perhaps the big and little types could be formalized policies, in a way that there could be a custom<1,3,0,4> endian type for very strange endians, with big and little just being instances thereof, perhaps with specializations for speed if needed.) The only advantage I see of the explicit one is that it theoretically allows cast<big_to_little>, but that would mean defining a number of types quadratic in the number of endiannesses. It clearly has no speed benefit over to_host then from_host on typical machines. I'm also not certain that it's even a useful operation.