Using a template for an internal method only

Is it possible to use a template for an internal method "only" without defining the class to be a template class itself....

My Compilers (M$VC6,gcc,cxx) don't seem to think so. They all compile but have trouble finding the method signature during link time.

class LibLoader
{
public:
  static  LibLoader* Instance ();
 
  bool    doesLibExist     (const char* libName) const;
  TLIB_ID loadLib          (const char* libName);
  bool    unLoadLib        (TLIB_ID libID);
 
  template <typename T>
  T   loadSymbol       (const char* symbolName, TLIB_ID libID,T a) const;
}

As you can probably tell the class is a dynamic library loader which is also a singleton.

The original problem stemed from loading the symbol to a correct type (void*) -> (definable function pointer). I achieved this easily with a simple template function however my efforts to clean it all up and put it in the class are proving problematic.


This is what i would ideally like to have....

//load library
TLIB_ID libID = LibLoader->loadLib("msvcrt.dll");

// define symbol type
typedef int (*myFunctionType)(const char*);

// create a variable for use    
myFunctionType a = 0;

// load the symbol with the help of a template method nested inside a non-templated class
a  = LibLoader->loadSymbol("atoi",libID,a);
   
I32 x = a("1234");

This is what works for now with the help of the templated function FuncEntry(.....) as defined below

template <class T>
T FuncEntry(T a,void *vEntry)
{
  long lEntry = ACE_reinterpret_cast (long, vEntry);
  return ACE_reinterpret_cast (T, lEntry);
}


void *entry;
   
typedef int (*myFunctionType)(const char*);
   
myFunctionType a = 0; // just to initialise b 4 use

TLIB_ID libID = LibLoader->loadLib("msvcrt.dll");
   
entry  = LibLoader->loadSymbol("atoi",libID);
   
a = FuncEntry(a,entry);

int x = a("1234");

/////////////////////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

Cheers