Two
weeks ago, Google hosted a two-day informal meeting to discuss
Concepts, a major new language feature for the next version of C++.
Concepts are the foundation of generic programming, but until now they
haven't been part of the actual C++ language. Last week's meeting was
part of a multi-year effort to improve C++ by adding explicit support
for Concepts. Papers have already been given at the Principles for
Programming Language Symposium (pdf) and the Object Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications Conference (
pdf).
Attendees
at last week's meeting made significant progress: the group finalized
many details of Concepts and resolved concerns about implementation
issues. Keep an eye on the C++ Standards Committee Website, as the final version of the concepts proposal will be available in just a few weeks.
[Photo
caption: Attendees at the C++ Concepts meeting came from both industry
and academia. Left to right: Martin Sebor (Rogue Wave), Chris Lattner
(Apple), John Spicer (EDG), Herb Sutter (Microsoft), Andrew Lumsdaine
(Indiana University), Michael Wong (IBM), Bjarne Stroustrup (Texas
A&M), Gabriel Dos Reis (Texas A&M), Thomas Witt (Zephyr
Associates), Mat Marcus (Adobe), Steve Clamage (Sun), Sean Parent
(Adobe), Lawrence Crowl (Google), Nathan Myers (Aspera Software), Doug
Gregor (Indiana University), Jaakko Jaarvi (Texas A&M), Matt
Austern (Google).]
