Re: Hiding Ugly Opaque Class Declarations: X++ S&I #2

[Michael McClary <michael>]

> From hibbert@evilotto Fri Jul 27 17:52:22 1990
> 
> [Hiding the opaque class declarations in an include file]

> From roger Fri Jul 27 18:29:42 1990
> 
> Nope: I'm opposed to this.

Ditto.  On those rare occasions where I bring up a smalltalk-generated
hxx file in an editor, I can skip past declarations I don't need to see
(especially if they're in a contiguous block) far more easily than I can
dig those I do need to see out of never-never-land.

The presence of the declarations at the beginning of the file is more
than something that is needed to get it to compile.  It is part of the
documentation of the module.  It declares what external interface is
required.

It IS a pity that the declarations must be a cluttering five lines long
(four of code plus one blank for readability).  But what must be must be.

I would have supported a separate include for each class, i.e.:

	#include "flubx.oxx"
	#include "glubx.oxx"
	#include "blubx.oxx"

IF the file name included the entire class name.  Unfortunately, this
doesn't work with even reasonably-sized class names and the filename
size limit.  (Not to mention what a bunch of tiny files does to some
filesystems.)

	michael