What makes Scala's operator overloading "good", but C++'s "bad"? [closed]

Question

Operator overloading in C++ is considered by many to be A Bad Thing(tm), and a mistake not to be repeated in newer languages. Certainly, it was one feature specifically dropped when designing Java.

Now that I've started reading up on Scala, I find that it has what looks very much like operator overloading (although technically it doesn't have operator overloading because it doesn't have operators, only functions). However, it wouldn't seem to be qualitatively different to the operator overloading in C++, where as I recall operators are defined as special functions.

So my question is what makes the idea of defining "+" in Scala a better idea than it was in C++?

Answer 1

C++ inherits true blue operators from C. By that I mean that the "+" in 6 + 4 is very special. You can't, for instance, get a pointer to that + function.

Scala on the other hand doesn't have operators in that way. It just has great flexibility in defining method names plus a bit of built in precedence for non-word symbols. So technically Scala doesn't have operator overloading.

Whatever you want to call it, operator overloading isn't inherently bad, even in C++. The problem is when bad programmers abuse it. But frankly, I'm of the opinion that taking away programmers ability to abuse operator overloading doesn't put a drop in the bucket of fixing all the things that programmers can abuse. The real answer is mentoring. http://james-iry.blogspot.com/2009/03/operator-overloading-ad-absurdum.html

None-the-less, there are differences between C++'s operator overloading and Scala's flexible method naming which, IMHO, make Scala both less abusable and more abusable.

In C++ the only way to get in-fix notation is using operators. Otherwise you must use object.message(argument) or pointer->messsage(argument) or function(argument1, argument2). So if you want a certain DSLish style to your code then there's pressure to use operators.

In Scala you can get infix notation with any message send. "object message argument" is perfectly ok, which means you don't need to use non-word symbols just to get infix notation.

C++ operator overloading is limited to essentially the C operators. Combined with the limitation that only operators may be used infix that puts pressure on people to try to map a wide range of unrelated concepts onto a relatively few symbols like "+" and ">>"

Scala allows a huge range of valid non-word symbols as method names. For instance, I've got an embedded Prolog-ish DSL where you can write

female('jane)!         // jane is female
parent('jane,'john)!   // jane is john's parent
parent('jane, 'wendy)! // jane is wendy's parent

mother('Mother, 'Child) :- parent('Mother, 'Child) & female('Mother) //'// a mother of a child is the child's parent and is female

mother('X, 'john)?  // find john's mother
mother('jane, 'X)?  // find's all of jane's children

The :-, !, ?, and & symbols are defined as ordinary methods. In C++ only & would be valid so an attempt to map this DSL into C++ would require some symbols that already evoke very different concepts.

Of course, this also opens up Scala to another kind of abuse. In Scala you can name a method $!&^% if you want to.

For other languages that, like Scala, are flexible in the use of non-word function and method names see Smalltalk where, like Scala, every "operator" is just another method and Haskell which allows the programmer to define precedence and fixity of flexibly named functions.