kimfalk posed a question about static functions in a class in http://www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/thread19241.html to which my reponse was duly correct by
You're mixing up your statics. :) static is overloaded for too many different uses. In a class declaration, static means that the name belongs to the class and not to individual objects. In a function definition, static means that the variable being declared has static storage duration. In the global scope, static is a deprecated feature that forces internal linkage.
Of 262 pages of text devoted to the subject of classes in C++ Primer Plus, I somehow missed the two paragraphs that were devoted to this topic.
I'm assuming the lack of attention is due to unlikelyhood of use, but would appreciate a practical example that is not taken from any theoretical text. To me it seems somewhat analogous to declaring all variables public, defeating the purpose of encapsulation to begin with and OOP as a whole.