what would you do instead ? surely you would not have std::string be a template directly and type std::string<char> / std::string<wchar_t> instead of std::string / std::wstring every time you want a string ?
cppreference doesn't have it yet, but as far as I can tell from P0259R0, basic_fixed_string is a template, both parameterized on the char type and the size N, and I can't see how it could be otherwise.
And no, if it weren't a template, it would not be possible to make it a template in the future as it would be a breaking change.
Not seeing a reason in this response for basic_${foo}, implying the existence of a ${not_so_basic}_string as was the original question. Sure typedef a template instantiation to get around language syntax awkwardness, that's fine. Why basic_string? why basic_fixed_string? Or is this just a curveball and it would have been better as
typedef _string<char> string etc
Or maybe not, I don't know what they had in mind, which is why I'm asking...
