Confused by asymmetric assignment operator templates

Hi,

Does anyone have an insight on why the code below produces linker errors claiming that the assignment operator template functions were not found ("LNK2019: unresolved external symbol", using MSVC 2008)? I assume I've messed something up, but can't figure it out myself...

Code:

---

-- a.h --
class A
{
        template <class T> operator=(const T& value);
};

-- a.cpp --
#include "a.h"
#include <iostream>

template <typename T>
A& A::operator=(const T& value)
{
        std::cout << value << std::endl;
        return *this;
}

-- main.cpp --
#include "a.h"

int main(int argc, char** argv)
{
        A a;

        a = 1.0f;
        a = "test";

        return 0;
}

---

Any help or thoughts on the subject would be greatly appreciated :)

You might want to read this FAQ: Why can't I separate the definition of my templates class from it's declaration and put it inside a .cpp file?

On a related, and arguably more relevant (since you have a function template) note: How can I avoid linker errors with my template functions?

You're absolutely right, that's what I wasn't taking in account for. Thank you very much for the links!