Re: Some questions about GOOPS and CLOS in general

[Mikael Djurfeldt <mdj at thalamus dot nada dot kth dot se>]

Mikael Djurfeldt <mdj@thalamus.nada.kth.se> writes:

> The task of designing a MOP with great power, but which also allows
> for an efficient implementation is in itself very difficult.  The
> problem is that if you introduce the kind of low-level interface you
> ask for, it either would involve the MOP, which would complicate it,
> or would prevent the MOP from being efficient.

While this is true, there is also a more obvious reason:

In the type of OO system you are thinking about, methods belong to
classes.  The natural representation would then be to store methods in
classes.

In GOOPS, the natural representation is to store methods in generic
functions.

While alternatives to these representations are possible, it is hard
to imagine a clean and nice generic OO interface which would support
both types of system.