Compiler chokes on a simple template - why?

[Giovanni Bajo]

Topi Maenpaa <topiolli@ee.oulu.fi> wrote:

> ---------------------------------------------------
> template <class T> class A
> {
> public:
>   template <class U> void test(T value) {}
> };
>
> template <class T> void test2(A<T>& a, T val)
> {
>   a.test<int>(val);
> }
>
> int main()
> {
>   A<int> a;
>   a.test<int>(1); //works fine
> }
> ---------------------------------------------------

This is ill-formed. You need to write:

a.template test<int>(val);

because 'a' is a dependent name.


> The funny thing is that if I change the name of the "test2" function
> to "test", everything is OK. The compiler complains only if the
> functions have different names. Why does the name matter?

This is surely a bug. Would you please file a bug report about this?

> The code compiles if "test2" is not a template function. Furthermore,
> calling A<T>::test directly from main rather than through the
> template function works fine.

This is correct, because if "test2" is not a template function name anymore,
then 'a' is not a dependent name, and the 'template' keyword is not needed to
disambiguate the parser.

Giovanni Bajo