One does not just "learn" C++.
I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
121–130 of 259 posts
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#122Many here talk about the complexity of C++. I concede it's a huge language, and not a beautiful one. However, I wouldn't call it that difficult. Being a systems language, once you understand (roughly, sans optimization finesse) how the machine code is generated it starts making a lot of sense. Maybe C++ is even educational because so many nuts and bolts are showing. Personally I'd recommend some systems programming t…
Many programming languages try to have perfect symmetry and because of that, fail to be useful in the real world. C++ has constructs such as template specialization that allow symmetry breaking. Symmetry breaking is what makes nature beautiful and therefore I would argue C++ IS a beautiful language. C++ is complex because the world is complex. Just as a mountain is shaped by time and the elements, C++ is also shaped…
The complexity of the world arises from simplicity. All complex things in the universe in the end are just atoms.
Is it better to build a complex programming language that handles real world complexity?
Or is it better to build a simple programming language where complexity is an emergent property than in turn use that to handle real world complexity.
One issue of building a complex programming language is that if you build the language to handle one type of complexity, it becomes hard mutate or shift that programming language to handle a different type of complexity. This is essentially the issue with whats happening with the newer versions of C++.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Making Rust work nicely with win32 is probably less effort (and more valuable) than getting enough momentum behind a good dependency manager for C++.
Rust works great on Windows. I use it every day. Is there anything specifically you had in mind that needs to be improved? Off the top of my head there is some tooling work that needs to be done, but cargo and rustup handle compiling, versioning, and dependency management flawlessly imo.
Person you're replying to probably means the win32 API, i.e. writing GUI applications for windows in Rust.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
c++ is not an OO language. C++ is a tool to get things done in the real world using whatever paradigm makes sense for your problem. Sometimes that is OO, sometimes not. C++ is very messy, but for the most part you can ignore the messy things.
For the most part, the world is messy ;-)
Everything in the world is made out of a single unit: Atoms. Complexity and messiness arise from different compositions of Atoms.
I feel we should build our programs the same way. Bottom up from a small set of simple primitives. Not top down like C++.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
I ran into this trying to get into it about 3 weeks ago. I'm so used to things like npm, ruby gems, go packages, pip that it felt like a huge task just to get something built or settle on a way for me to build mine. Even grabbing libraries from github, I was unsure if I should grab just the headers and DLLs, or import the entire tree and mashup my build scripts with theirs. I wish I had stayed with it since college b…
> Even grabbing libraries from github, I was unsure if I should grab just the headers and DLLs, or import the entire tree and mashup my build scripts with theirs. Honestly this is something that apt (et al.) make so easy on Linux distros that when you move to Mac or Windows you just have hard time believing people still in 2018 have to _deal with this shit_ (installing libraries and their headers by downloading each…
> chocolatey, who came up with that name
The chocolatey repo (https://github.com/chocolatey/choco/wiki/History) explains the name as a pun based on the previous package manager NuGet: "Chocolatey started out as a joke because everyone loves Chocolatey nougat (nuget)."
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've been in the same boat--relearning C++ after using C++98(!) for a long time. My first go-to book was _A Tour of C++_ , 2e by Stroustrup. Also _Effective Modern C++_ by Scott Meyers (of _Effective C++_ fame). Other books I've been reading: _C++ 17 The Complete Guide_ by Josuttis _C++ 17 in Detail_ by Filipek Lots of good blogs out there. Also the CPP Podcast. http://cppcast.com/ There are also a lot of great blogs…
I used to swear by Meyers in my old C++ days; his Effective C++ and More Effective C++ were my favorite software books. But recently, in the course of catching up with modern C++, I got the impression his ideas aren't considered good in the current community anymore. Can anyone comment on that?
Interestingly Meyers is now a "retired C++ expert". He says he can't keep up anymore with the current C++ standard development to properly maintain errata for his books.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
Things I'd rather be doing: * C++ * Lua .. .. [a thousand other things] .. .. * Node * Javascript __ bottom of the pile.. The Node/JS ecosystem is such a steaming pile of garbage, I can honestly see with great clarity why people should be running from it back into the arms of C++[11,17] ..
You shouldn't make broad statements like that. In my personal experience, I have found Javascript much easier than C++. If I want to install a package, I can just do "npm install Now, I'm sure some people have an easier time with Makefiles, but I've found it even easier to get up and running in Javascript. Most of the tools in Javascript (create-react-app, Webpack, etc.) are very user friendly, making setup trivial.…
I'm reading this because I'm about to move back to systems programming after a 6 year journey into Javascript Nodejs full-stack developement.
Don't underestimate the pile of garbage JS indeed is! Yes, you can install a package with ease, you'll have to do that with about 100 packages that keep changing all the time with all kinds of breaking changes (not talking about their 1000's of dependencies). I'm also sick and tired of the hipster JS community where every piece of shit can become a hype. With JS you'll be forced to work with things you hate. Almost all codebases I have to work with are horrendous piles of rubbish that often need to be completely rewritten from scratch. Almost everything you write doesn't last. You've spent a year learning Backbone? Just throw it away, now it's Angular you can start all over again. One year later? Stop doing Angular, it's React now, just start all over again! Hey, now we have some hipsters promoting Vue, they say it's the holy grail, just start all over again, it's fun! Flux stores? Fluxxor, Alt, Redux, Redux with Saga's, or just go with Thunk? It doesn't matter that much, it only lasts for 1 or 2 years! I'm completely sick and tired of it, including the fact that I'm only working on stupid e-commerce websites..
Talking about make files, a magnitude easier than trying to setup babel and webpack for a medium sized SSR SPA. I recently had to upgrade from babel 6 to 7, what a fuckin pain that was, so many changes, the deployment server refused to boot etc, etc..
Mind your step going into JS!
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#128I also used 2018 to learn and get proficient in C++. Honestly, I don’t really like it. The only real reason for that is that using smart pointers is verbose, but I don’t want to do manual memory management where it’s possible to instead rely on RAII. Ironically enough, though, C++ is probably the second of two languages I’d consider my “go to.”
If you're using smart pointers enough to be bothered by verbosity I think it's somewhat likely you're overusing heap allocation and / or not making enough use of standard containers. Explicitly dealing with heap allocation via smart pointers should be a tool you only reach for occasionally in most code. Heap memory management should usually be wrapped in another library class, either a standard container or a custom type and most non library code should generally be using stack allocation.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#129"To round up, C++ does not dictate about its tooling, which basically gives lot of choices and flexibility. But at the same time it is making it complex for beginners to come in to projects and start projects with it." This was a big problem for me when I first started using C++. I don't remember it being too bad when I was just working on small projects and things I wanted to do at school. The problems started when…
I do not understand the mentality of "opinionated" frameworks or tools being a good thing, and the trend toward said frameworks disturbs me greatly. What people call "opinionated" is nothing more than something being "architected". Someone has made a bunch of decisions for you that down the road you have no idea whether or not it will actually be good for you. Using these types of frameworks short-circuits the proces…
> Someone has made a bunch of decisions for you that down the road you have no idea whether or not it will actually be good for you
Opinionated also means that these decisions will be the same in other places/projects I may join. In the medium and long term, that advantage may easily offset the value of custom decisions.
Re: I learnt C++ in 2018 and have no regrets
#130"To round up, C++ does not dictate about its tooling, which basically gives lot of choices and flexibility. But at the same time it is making it complex for beginners to come in to projects and start projects with it." This was a big problem for me when I first started using C++. I don't remember it being too bad when I was just working on small projects and things I wanted to do at school. The problems started when…
I ran into this trying to get into it about 3 weeks ago. I'm so used to things like npm, ruby gems, go packages, pip that it felt like a huge task just to get something built or settle on a way for me to build mine. Even grabbing libraries from github, I was unsure if I should grab just the headers and DLLs, or import the entire tree and mashup my build scripts with theirs. I wish I had stayed with it since college b…
Have you looked at vcpkg? It's the simplest way to use third party libraries on Windows in my experience. Many popular open source libraries are supported out the box by vcpkg now.