API: Use of C++ namespaces instead of name prefixes

[blarg]

In very many places, GDAL's C++ API doesn't use C++ namespaces; instead it uses name prefixes such as GDAL or OGR.

Is there a particular reason for this? The C++ language introduced namespaces for a multitude of apparently-good reasons.

The constant repetition of the all capitals name prefixes causes additional typing, it hurts my eyes because it's like the API is always SHOUTING AT ME, and it just feels so... C-ish and 1990s-ish.

Would a series of patches creating a GDAL namespace (and perhaps an OGR namespace too), containing de-prefixed typedefs for the non-namespaced, prefixed names, be accepted?

Ie:

namespace GDAL {
typedef ::GDALDataset Dataset;
}

The obvious intention would be to one day deprecate all of the non-namespaced, prefixed names.

[Even Rouault]

There are backwards implication in doing such changes. This should be discussed as a RFC, and probably for a GDAL 3.0

[blarg]

To be clear and explicit, the problem with this proposal is not backward compatibility - this change would not break anything.

The problem here is that there is only any point in doing such work, if the long-term intention of the GDAL project is to move away from C-style FOObar() name prefixes, and towards C++-style foo::bar namespaces.

Thus, I agree this should be an RFC (but I have no idea how to create one of those).

[blarg]

Can someone please point me to documentation explaining how to create an RFC regarding this?

Also, can someone please give me an idea what there is to discuss?

[Even Rouault]

Existing RFCs are listed at ​https://trac.osgeo.org/gdal/wiki/RfcList . You can have a look at the few last ones to see the topics usually covered

[Even Rouault]

This ticket has been automatically closed because Trac is no longer used for GDAL bug tracking, since the project has migrated to GitHub. If you believe this ticket is still valid, you may file it to ​https://github.com/OSGeo/gdal/issues if it is not already reported there.