Re: assert_handler?

From:
Thorsten Ottosen <thorsten.ottosen@dezide.com>
Newsgroups:
comp.std.c++
Date:
10 May 2006 18:30:01 GMT
Message-ID:
<446226BC.702@dezide.com>
Bob Bell wrote:

Thorsten Ottosen wrote:

John Nagle wrote:

A "public" section means you're putting the object into
a valid state, then leaving the object.


We are trying to minimize the number of new constructs. What you can do
in our proposal is to call a public member:

class someclass
{
public:
  void f();
  void f_helper();
};

void someclass::f()
{
  ... // some code
  f_helper(); // would correspond to your "public section"
  ... // more code
}

I thing we ripped out of the proposal was to be able to call the
invariant explicitly.

Is the above not good enough?


The problem occurs when an A object, while in an "invariants suspended"
state, calls out to some function F() which then calls back to the A
object.

Either F() is calling back to A through a public function (in which
case invariants are checked),


Right.

or else F() is a friend. It seems to me
that friendship is a relationship that says "it's OK to call into A
while invariants are suspended" -- after all, a friend of A has
complete access to the implementation state of A, and can do anything
it wishes, including breaking the invariants. Therefore, if friend F()
calls back into A through some private interface that doesn't check
invariants, that's OK; in fact, I think it's the correct behavior.


Agreed.

So to answer your question, yes, what you've got is good enough,
because the only way a non-friend can get back into A is through an
operation that will check invariants.

The only quibble I have is with protected members. Suppose F() is a
member of a derived class of A. If it calls back into A through a
protected member of A, this is not the same as friendship -- protected
does not grant access to implementation.


not unless that is also protected.

Therefore, it's not OK to call
into A while invariants are suspended. So invariants must be checked on
protected member functions as well as public member functions.


I tend to agree.

-Thorsten

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