On 04/16/2013 07:57 AM, Tofu Ninja wrote: > seems like bad design to > have a function that is fully intended to be a class function but not > actually be able to declare it within the class block.
It would be bad design if a class variable decided to refer to another object without the owner of that variable knowing about it.
I think the most accurate reason why this is not possible is that the 'this' reference inside a member function is just a local class variable (or "handle"). If you could make it refer to a new object, then only that local reference would be affected and the outside variable would not know about it.
Ali
