Method overloading with const/non-const variants (was: Re: KDE/kdelibs/kdecore)

[Thiago Macieira]

Richard Dale wrote:
>I think it is great that people can understand these rules, and manage
> to write code where they understand how it works. But personally I wish
> we didn't use const overloading in KDE libs unless absolutely
> necessary. There are no other languages apart from C++, that use const
> overloading as far as I know, and it makes it awkward for language
> bindings.

Indeed.

In case of const overloading, there should be a constFoo function that is 
const only, so that you can access it from other languages too, as well 
as making code clearer.

Anyways, you can always call the const function if you want by making your 
object const too:

	Object *foo;
	const Object *constFoo = foo;

or
	Object foo;
	const Object &constFoo = foo;

This can be done even in the binding.

-- 
  Thiago Macieira  -  thiago (AT) macieira.info - thiago (AT) kde.org
    PGP/GPG: 0x6EF45358; fingerprint:
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