Hello. I use boost.serialization to perform save and load to files. If a class is serializable through the boost mechanism, I'd like to easily add the "savable" feature (through serialization and boost archives). Here how I do, and then I've got 2 questions. I don't post all the #include statements. Let's have a serializable class (I only use text archive for this example) ---------MyClass.h--------- class MyClass { friend class boost::serialization::access; template<class Archive> void serialize(Archive & ar, const unsigned int version); int data_; public: MyClass(); virtual ~MyClass(); }; BOOST_CLASS_EXPORT_KEY(MyClass) ---------MyClass.cpp--------- MyClass::MyClass() : data_(123) {} MyClass::~MyClass() {} template<class Archive> void MyClass::serialize(Archive & ar, const unsigned int version) { ar & data_; } // instanciate the serialize function for text archives #include "boost/archive/text_iarchive.hpp" #include "boost/archive/text_oarchive.hpp" template void MyClass::serialize(boost::archive::text_iarchive & ar, const unsigned int version); template void MyClass::serialize(boost::archive::text_oarchive & ar, const unsigned int version); BOOST_CLASS_EXPORT_IMPLEMENT(MyClass) --------- Now I define a FileSavable class. Its purpose is to add the "save-to-file" feature to a class that can be serialized in a text archive, making the latter inherting from FileSavable, and adding a line in its serialize function, I write it below). ---------FileSavable.h--------- class FileSavable { friend class boost::serialization::access; template<class Archive> void serialize(Archive & ar, const unsigned int version); public: virtual ~FileSavable() {} void SaveToFile(std::string path); void LoadFromFile(std::string path); }; BOOST_CLASS_EXPORT_KEY(FileSavable) ---------FileSavable.cpp--------- template<class Archive> void FileSavable::serialize(Archive & ar, const unsigned int version) {} void FileSavable::SaveToFile(std::string path) { std::ofstream ofs(path.c_str()); assert(ofs.good()); boost::archive::text_oarchive oa(ofs); oa & this; } void FileSavable::LoadFromFile(std::string path) { std::ifstream ifs(path.c_str()); assert(ifs.good()); boost::archive::text_iarchive ia(ifs); FileSavable* p; ia & p; *this = *p; delete p; } // instanciate the serialize function for text archives #include "boost/archive/text_iarchive.hpp" #include "boost/archive/text_oarchive.hpp" template void FileSavable::serialize(boost::archive::text_iarchive & ar, const unsigned int version); template void FileSavable::serialize(boost::archive::text_oarchive & ar, const unsigned int version); BOOST_CLASS_EXPORT_IMPLEMENT(FileSavable) ---------Modification to MyClass--------- It now inherit from FileSavable: class MyClass : public FileSavable The serialize function call the base class: template<class Archive> void MyClass::serialize(Archive & ar, const unsigned int version) { ar & boost::serialization::base_object<FileSavable>(*this); ar & data_; } --------- Thanks if you read me until here, now my questions: 1) I don't care the FileSavable part of MyClass being serialized, but if I don't call it with boost::serialization::base_object, I have a runtime error: terminate called after throwing an instance of 'boost::archive::archive_exception' what(): unregistered void cast 7MyClass<-11FileSavable Do you see a way to avoid having to add this line in MyClass? Ideally, just having to inheriting from FileSavable would be great: a simple way to add a feature. 2) As you can see, my LoadFromFile function first creates a new MyClass object in p, by de-serializing an archive, and then copies this newly created object into "*this", and finally deletes the object created by the archive d-eserialization. I didn't find a way to avoid this temporary and de-serialize directly in this. Moreover, my solution is not exception-safe, but I didn't manage to de-serialize in a temporary auto_ptr nor boost::shared_ptr. Thanks in advance for replies. Nicolas.