Use of struct identifier to signify POD types and C structures

Question

Consider the following piece of code:

struct Foo {};

template<typename ForwardIterator>
struct Foo*
Bar(ForwardIterator first, ForwardIterator last)
{ 
    (void)first;
    (void)last;
    Foo *foo(nullptr);
    return foo;
}

The above piece of code compiles fine in Clangv3.5 and GCCv4.9.

However, it fails to compile in VC++2013.

Removing the struct identifier (see below) from the return type solves the problem:

struct Foo {};

template<typename ForwardIterator>
Foo*
Bar(ForwardIterator first, ForwardIterator last)
{ 
    (void)first;
    (void)last;
    Foo *foo(nullptr);
    return foo;
}

Q1:

Is this a visual studio bug?

Q2:

This issue came up, because in my code-base the Foo struct lies in a .h.c file (i.e., is a C struct) and in order to signify C/POD structs in my code, I use the struct identifier. Is this a bad idea (i.e., in C++ code I should avoid to use struct identifier in this fashion)?

Answer 1

The main point of an elaborated type specifiers is to allow you refer to a name that has been hidden, from the draft C++ standard section 3.4.4 Elaborated type specifiers:

An elaborated-type-specifier (7.1.6.3) may be used to refer to a previously declared class-name or enum-name even though the name has been hidden by a non-type declaration (3.3.10).

and so in the case where Foo is hidden, you would have to use an elaborated type specifiers:

struct Foo {};

void Foo()
{
}

I see nothing in 7.1.6.3 Elaborated type specifiers or 14 Templates that would prevent this use. In fact it looks like from the description of CS2989 Visual Studio is getting confused and thinks you are attempting to redefine a non-template class as a template class.

So this looks like a bug to me, so I would file a bug report.

Update

Filed a bug report.