I recently took a look at the STL library, which I understand is supposed to
become part of the ANSI C++ standard.
I was disappointed to find out that it didn't take into account the class
names and signatures of a pre-existing attempt at defining standard C++
containers, namely the ODMG OO database standard.
A fundamental principle of ODMG (and, in my opinion, of any good OO
database) is that persistence should be orthogonal to type.
If I have to use different containers for persistent and non-persistent
objects, the usefulness of an OO database is greatly reduced.
I think ODMG is important to the C++ community (or maybe you prefer embedded
SQL for database access ?), and C++ is important to the OO database
community.
If independent bodies defining open standards don't make more efforts to
coordinate, I'm afraid they will pave the way for monolithic and
monopolistic companies to impose technically inferior standards whose only
advantage will be consistency across technological areas.

I'd like to hear some comments about this.

 Didier Frick
 Software developer & consultant