Would it be unreasonable to offer both approaches, the individual functions as well as the 'do-all' approach?

Specifically, in my case, I will be adding data to the internatl structure by a function "add_data_point", which is explicit in what it takes such that it could be prototyped. ($$;$% for example). I could then define various functions "add_data_from_TYPE", TYPE being replaced by what method of data storage I would expect there (hash of hashes, array of hashes, etc). Each function would call add_data_point repeated to add the data to the internal storage in the appropriate manner. This would provide the consistent interface for the API. Again, these functions could be prototyped without problems. I could then provide one last function "add_data", which would do the checks that I suggest in the root node of this thread, and then call out to the specific "add_data_from_TYPE" calls depending on the type of structure. This provides more of the "intelligent" interface for the API, without adding a lot of extra code.

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Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com || "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain