On Thu, 20 Jan 2011 12:52:25 -0800 Mostafa <mostafa_working_away@yahoo.com> wrote:
Can we stick to std::string conventions as closely as possible? It makes using whatever new string library that much easier, and clearer, and maintainable.
Is there a conventional way to get the data stored in an std::string? ;-)
On second thought, is there really a need to access the underlying data of utf8_t? I argue that having a view of the underlying data via iterators accomplishes just as much(*), and is more inline with the stl tradition of containers and iterators, not to mention the better encapsulation it affords the interface. Do clients really need to know, and potentially develop a dependency on, the fact that utf8_t (for now?) is really just a wrapper for std::string?
For interaction with functions that require std::string, and presumably don't care about the encoding, it's convenient. Without it, using the UTF classes with such a function requires calling the std::string constructor with the element iterators. That's going to be a major need for the foreseeable future. -- Chad Nelson Oak Circle Software, Inc. * * *