This is an unofficial snapshot of the ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG21 Core Issues List revision 113d. See http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg21/ for the official list.

2024-03-20


2630. Syntactic specification of class completeness

Section: 11.4.1  [class.mem.general]     Status: C++23     Submitter: Jim X     Date: 2022-07-04

[Accepted as a DR at the November, 2022 meeting.]

Consider:

// translation unit 1
export module A;
export class X {};

// translation unit 2
import A;
X x; // is X complete at this point?

Subclause 11.4.1 [class.mem.general] paragraph 8 specifies:

A class is considered a completely-defined object type (6.8.1 [basic.types.general]) (or complete type) at the closing } of the class-specifier. ...

The syntactic (even lexical) reference to the closing } does not address the question when a different translation unit regards a class as complete. However, it seems this provision is entirely redundant given 6.3 [basic.def.odr] paragraph 13:

A definition of a class shall be reachable in every context in which the class is used in a way that requires the class type to be complete.

The standard never asks the question: "Is class X complete?"; it always specifies "X shall be complete" (otherwise the program is ill-formed).

Possible resolution [SUPERSEDED]:

Change in 11.4.1 [class.mem.general] paragraph 8 as follows:

A class is considered a completely-defined object type (6.8.1 [basic.types.general]) (or complete type) at the closing } of the class-specifier. The A class is regarded as complete within its complete-class contexts; otherwise it is regarded as incomplete within its own class member-specification.

CWG telecon 2022-10-21:

Explicitly refer to reachable definitions.

Proposed resolution (approved by CWG 2022-11-09):

Change in 11.4.1 [class.mem.general] paragraph 8 as follows:

A class is considered a completely-defined object type (6.8.1 [basic.types.general]) (or complete type) at the closing } of the class-specifier. The A class is regarded as complete where its definition is reachable and within its complete-class contexts; otherwise it is regarded as incomplete within its own class member-specification.