> Henry Vermaak wrote: > >> I'm not sure what you mean - do you mean would I be willing to write the > >> support myself? > > > > i think he's asking what the use of it is. number 2 under the link he > > gave. > > Oh, ok. Well, I'll try to summarize: > > Class constants add the ability to provide scoped, "namespaced" constants.
A constant is already in a scope, the unit. > Although one can handle basic scoping with global constants, by placing them > in interface vs implementation, they were not designed to be scope-limited. > They also do not provide a way to group several constants under a common > name, though one can simulate this functionality using creative constant > names. Stuff them in one unit. unitname.constant. > Some of the benefits of class constants are: 1. They provide object-oriented > constants, That's a description, not a benefit. Taste matters are difficult to measure. > 2. They simplify coding by saving the developer from having to > write long constant names to distinguish global constants from each other. > 3. They reduce coding errors due to the ability to only make public what is > necessary, keeping what is visible to outside units/classes to a mimimum. Units/move them to implementation. The chance that random classes in the same unit clash is negliable. > Personally, the main reason I need them is for compatibility. I have a large > Delphi codebase that I'm porting to FPC and it uses class constants all over > the code. IMHO that is the only decent reason. Technically IMHO it doesnt make much sense, it's just a dotnetism, copying blindly from a different world to make nice feature butlletlists. And like the rest of the dotnetims, they are relatively little used, probably mostly out D7- compat reasons. And thus they are waiting for an implementor. I'm not aware of work being done on any of them (though I have a vaguely recollection that the strict private and protected exist, but I'm not sure if in fully compat form). Besides implementing, making a good study of what they _EXACTLY_ do, and a bunch of testcases/unittests could really further the cause also. _______________________________________________ fpc-pascal maillist - fpc-pascal@lists.freepascal.org http://lists.freepascal.org/mailman/listinfo/fpc-pascal
