[WalterBright]

> What's broken about namespaces?

The difficulty I have with them is they are open, not closed. Any piece of code can crack open a namespace and insert more names into it. Thus, you can have problems with "hijacking", where foo(int) is inserted, while unknown to you someone else inserted foo(unsigned) that does something completely different, and the compiler decides the latter is a better overload match.

Complicating things further, the names visible in a namespace are dependent on where the compiler is lexically in the code - more names can be inserted further down.

As a counterpoint, many have suggested to me that this openness is a critical capability they need for their code. My answer is that using namespaces in that manner offers little improvement over just using a prefix on the identifiers.

And so the debate goes on!

[snovv_crash]

Well yes, it is a prefix, but it is a prefix that doesn't need to be used when you are already inside the namespace or if you explicity 'using namespace' it. If I had to type the full namespace of functions and enums all the time I'd go insane.

[gpderetta]

well yes they are open by design. If you want closed namespaces just put your functions (as statics) inside a struct.

Btw, visibility rules in a namespace (but not in a struct/class) are the same as for the global namespace, so no, a function in a namespace won't see another declared after it.