🚀 go-pugleaf

I would like to propose that the standard deal with the following
issue.  I would like to write a subroutine in C++ that gets called by
an existing program.  The subroutine might get loaded with a dynamic
loader into an already compiled program to which I, the C++
programmer, have no access.  I imagine other people have the same
situation.

In this case, there is no C++ main().  Nonetheless, I would still like
to use C++ features like global static data items whose constructors
and destructors get called.

To handle this, I would like to be able to put an explicit call like
"cpp_start()" at the entry point of the routine, and "cpp_finish()" at
the end that would take care of all the initialization/cleanup C++
normally does in main.  As programmer, I would take responsibility for
making sure that nothing is done before cpp_start() or after
cpp_finish().

In fact, some C++ implementations already offer such a call just for
this purpose.  See, for example,
     http://www.mathworks.com/1606.html
which describes how to write dynamically-loadable C++ subroutines for
matlab using the Watcom C++ compiler.

But as far as I know, the names of these start/finish calls are not
standardized, so I can't count on portability.

Thanks,
Steve Vavasis
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