What do we gain from this? Several things.
* First, usage of PATH_MAX (the POSIX constant) is eliminated.
PATH_MAX is actually a lie; Linux and OS X (and probably other BSDs
too) do not have an actual path length limit. Linux claims 4096,
OS X claims 1024, but it is trivial to construct paths that are
longer.
* Second, while Windows does enforce a limit of MAX_PATH (the Win32
constant) for its ASCII functions, the Unicode variants, when
used with UNC paths, do not have this restriction.
The capability to use UNC paths is useful by itself, as it allows
to access files on network shares directly.
* Third, representing paths as std::string will make it easier to
interoperate with *W WinAPI functions later.
The main benefit is that std::swap will ensure that the type
of arguments is copy-constructible and move-constructible.
It is more concise as well.
When min and max are defined as macros, they will conflict
with STL header files included by other C++ libraries;
in this case STL will #undef any other definition.
The SolveSpace top-level directory was getting a bit cluttered, so
following the example of numerous other free-software projects, we move the
main application source into a subdirectory and adjust the build systems
accordingly.
Also, got rid of the obj/ directory in favor of creating it on the fly in
Makefile.msvc.
whitequark
Daniel Richard G