Wireshark mailing list archives
Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++
From: Evan Huus <eapache () gmail com>
Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2013 12:36:52 -0500
On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 12:18 PM, Richard Stearn <richard () rns-stearn demon co uk> wrote:
A thought from the sidelines. I have contributed to Wireshark, once. I probably will not contribute again (unless I find another protocol itch to scratch). This is an observation from scratching that itch. Creating suite of dissectors from the skeletons in the development guide was not difficult. When I did not understand how a particular function worked it was a simple matter to find the code and read. Often with object oriented languages it is not that simple as you may need to follow the inheritance and the advantage of hiding the detail rapidly unravels.
That's partly a hint that in general we need better documentation for our APIs, but it's a valid point regardless. Again, this thread was started with the thought that using a C++ compiler might be helpful - I specifically tried to avoid the discussion about re-architecting in an object-oriented style since that's obviously much more complicated and less (to me) clear-cut.
Would moving to C++ discourage or encourage potential contributors?
Moving just to a C++ compiler shouldn't cause problems for anybody. While C++ isn't technically a superset of C, it is trivial for C programmers to avoid the few areas of incompatibility (as far as I know there are simply a few more reserved words like 'new' to avoid in variable names).
Can the complexity of the classes be controlled?
As I've already mentioned, moving to C++ as a language and to object-oriented as a paradigm is a much bigger discussion, and there isn't a whole lot of point in even having it until we've moved to writing C on a C++ compiler.
Is time/effort available to document the class hierarchy?
Documentation is needed regardless of language. You seem to be taking it as given that C++ inherently needs more documentation than C, but why that would be isn't immediately apparent to me. Either way, moving to C++ constructs was really not the original proposal.
Because I am on the sidelines here I am not (and should not be) saying "don't", just saying please consider carefully.
That's what this thread is for :) Evan ___________________________________________________________________________ Sent via: Wireshark-dev mailing list <wireshark-dev () wireshark org> Archives: http://www.wireshark.org/lists/wireshark-dev Unsubscribe: https://wireshark.org/mailman/options/wireshark-dev mailto:wireshark-dev-request () wireshark org?subject=unsubscribe
Current thread:
- Idle Though - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Guy Harris (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Donald White (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Ed Beroset (Feb 10)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 10)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Dirk Jagdmann (Feb 11)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Richard Stearn (Feb 11)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 11)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Jakub Zawadzki (Feb 11)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Jaap Keuter (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Gerald Combs (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Jaap Keuter (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Guy Harris (Feb 09)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 11)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Evan Huus (Feb 12)
- Re: Idle Thought - Compiling with C++ Guy Harris (Feb 11)