template <class ttype>
ttype multiply(ttype a, ttype b)
{
return a * b;
}
And yet every programming language that I can think of returns an int when you multiply two ints, and we get along (mostly) just fine. Did you have a better option in mind for that bit of code?
I mentioned C+++ Templates: The Complete Guide - it demonstrates a similar template (15.2.4) to add two values, and even with simple addition it points out a flaw similar to this one (and admittedly more likely to come up in the real world) - determining the return type for, say, int + char. Their solution is a traits class with a specialization for each pair of types. Sounds complicated, but then again, so is writing a template function to perform simple multiplication.