Generic Programming in 3D

Abstract

Support for generic programming consists of three essential ingredients: support for overloaded functions, a run-time type representation, and a generic view on data. Different approaches to datatype-generic programming occupy different points in this design space. In this article, we revisit the `Scrap your boilerplate' approach and identify its location within the three-dimensional design space. The characteristic features of `Scrap your boilerplate' are its two generic views, the `spine' view for consuming and transforming data, and the `type-spine' view for producing data. We show how to combine these views with different overloading mechanisms and type representations.