On 11 March 2011 16:35, SPUeNTRUP - Kai Henningsen wrote: > ... or more precisely, > error: type ‘accessor_parameter<T, (sizeof (T) > sizeof (T*))>’ is not derived from type ‘C3Variable<T>’ > > In this case, I can work around this, but I'd like to understand what > is going on here. The accessor_parameter is a return type of a method of > template class C3Variable (an otherwise trivial getter method of an > instance var of type T). (The main point is to automate the decision of > transferring a value or a pointer to the value, thus the condition.) > > gcc -v: > > Using built-in specs. > Target: x86_64-linux-gnu > Configured with: ../src/configure -v --with-pkgversion='Ubuntu/Linaro 4.4.4-14ubuntu5' --with-bugurl=file:///usr/share/doc/gcc-4.4/README.Bugs --enable-languages=c,c++,fortran,objc,obj-c++ --prefix=/usr --program-suffix=-4.4 --enable-shared --enable-multiarch --enable-linker-build-id --with-system-zlib --libexecdir=/usr/lib --without-included-gettext --enable-threads=posix --with-gxx-include-dir=/usr/include/c++/4.4 --libdir=/usr/lib --enable-nls --with-sysroot=/ --enable-clocale=gnu --enable-libstdcxx-debug --enable-objc-gc --disable-werror --with-arch-32=i686 --with-tune=generic --enable-checking=release --build=x86_64-linux-gnu --host=x86_64-linux-gnu --target=x86_64-linux-gnu > Thread model: posix > gcc version 4.4.5 (Ubuntu/Linaro 4.4.4-14ubuntu5) > > Oh, just in case it matters: > > template < class C, bool > struct accessor_parameter { > }; > template <> template < class C > struct accessor_parameter <C, true > { > typedef const C & type; > }; > template <> template < class C > struct accessor_parameter <C, false > { > typedef C type; > }; > # define accessor_pt(T) \ > accessor_parameter < T, (sizeof(T) > sizeof(T *)) >::type > > ... and more macros, ending in ACCESSOR_R(name, type) for a getter, > ACCESSOR_W(name, type) for a setter, and so on. I believe this is the > first time I tried to use this in a template class, however. In this case, the error is not very helpful. It means you have a missing "typename" template<class T> struct C3Variable { accessor_pt(T) get(); }; Needs to be changed to template<class T> struct C3Variable { typename accessor_pt(T) get(); }; (Or you could put the "typename" in the macro, but then it wouldn't work in non-templates)