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Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

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Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#171

Post by brianush1 »

moonchild wrote: post #132
fbkr wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> C language has some very limited implicit type conversions What? C will happily compile this: void g() { float f = 3.14; int* ip = &f; } C++ has no such _craziness_. Your strawman actually has pretty good uses: complex c = 3i; ... = c + 4; Would you rather have the last line not compile because 4 is not a complex number? Because one _could_ argue that 4 is a complex number, and C++ can represent this with an implic…

The second case is easily solved by having an overload operator+(complex lhs, int rhs). No need to convert anything.

    complex c = 4;
Would you rather have this line not compile because 4 is not a complex number? Because one _could_ argue that 4 is a complex number, and C++ can represent this with an implicit constructor.

The issue with C++ is that implicit is the default, not that it exists.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#172

Post by jnxx »

jarjoura wrote: post #29

So first, C++ in a small codebase with a small team, is a very powerful language that really does produce the best code. That's what you want in a professional, top tier code base and that's what you get. Unfortunately, once a project grows to many developers, many of whom have varying levels of experience, it's just too easy to write bad C++ that becomes impossible to debug. I've been using it for a decade and I swe…

> So first, C++ in a small codebase with a small team, is a very powerful language that really does produce the best code.

Does it?

https://benchmarksgame-team.pages.debian.net/benchmarksgame/...

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#174

Post by mbeex »

jnxx wrote: post #135
balaam wrote: post #101

C++ fills a niche and probably if you use it all on your own you don't even see the problems. But if you use it at scale with multiple developers you can see it's layers of leaky abstraction laid down since the 80s that can never really be cleaned because too much is built on this foundation. This slightly over 100 page book on move semantics https://leanpub.com/cppmove shows some of the iceberg like complexities dot…

> This slightly over 100 page book on move semantics https://leanpub.com/cppmove shows some of the iceberg like complexities dotted all over the place. Some developers probably never use and have never even heard of move semantics. I think Scott Meyers' "Effective Modern C++" which is in large part a collection of caveats and description of things which don't fit always together also underlines that impression: https…

My entry in professional C++ programming was accompanied by Scotts earlier books. The moment gradually to refrain from the language as my main tool again coincides (coincidence?) with his retreat.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#175

Post by 59nadir »

fbkr wrote: post #90
flowerlad wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Implicit type conversions are inherited from C, the language you called "awesome". It is true that C language has some very limited implicit type conversions. For example you can say: long n = 3; And the integer 3 is converted to long. This is extremely limited, and does not make the program hard to understand, which is completely different from the craziness you see in C++.

> C language has some very limited implicit type conversions What? C will happily compile this: void g() { float f = 3.14; int* ip = &f; } C++ has no such _craziness_. Your strawman actually has pretty good uses: complex c = 3i; ... = c + 4; Would you rather have the last line not compile because 4 is not a complex number? Because one _could_ argue that 4 is a complex number, and C++ can represent this with an implic…

One of the main gripes I have with C++ is exactly what you said, that the defaults usually are the wrong for the usual cases and for general sanity.

With that said, C programmers also seem to love their implicit behavior so it's pretty clear where this kind of thinking comes from.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#177

Post by nendroid »

jcelerier wrote: post #170
nendroid wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Python developer here just switched jobs to one that does C++. Let me warn you right now. It's not worth it. At all. Don't go down this path. Memory management is easy, but that's not the only crap you have to deal with. Templating and the whole C++ ecosystem with Cmake compiling to make is a giant headache. It takes about a week to integrate a new C++ library in source code and people are worried about installing or…

> while in python I'll install an entire library in seconds just to try out a function. but... surely you are aware that the memory leak concern absolutely does not disappear ? you just choose to not care about it in the python case for "reasons" - likely you've never been hit by a system which appends to a dynamic array without ever emptying it, and that can happen in every single language in the world.

No it doesn't... but it's far less likely to occur. Web development practices usually avoid this problem as state is handled externally.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#178

Post by hchz »

wirthjason wrote: post #37
john_moscow wrote: post #20

Like every programming language out there, C++ is a tool. And like every tool out there it has its uses. There isn't any point of using C++ to count words in a text file. Any high-level language like Python will beat you to it. However, there's one thing you can do in C++ and not in Python or JavaScript or PHP: fully control the memory layout of your data. While you don't need it in most of the cases, it becomes a ki…

> There isn't any point of using C++ to count words in a text file. Any high-level language like Python will beat you to it. However, there's one thing you can do in C++ and not in Python or JavaScript or PHP: fully control the memory layout of your data. Any books or resources for digging deeper in these kinds of topics? I’m a Python developer and would like to learn C++ but the just the reasons you mentioned make i…

Kill two birds with one stone by learning more about the structure of the Python interpreter and builtins implementations by reading the source.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#179

Post by nendroid »

cute_boi wrote: post #158
nendroid wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Python developer here just switched jobs to one that does C++. Let me warn you right now. It's not worth it. At all. Don't go down this path. Memory management is easy, but that's not the only crap you have to deal with. Templating and the whole C++ ecosystem with Cmake compiling to make is a giant headache. It takes about a week to integrate a new C++ library in source code and people are worried about installing or…

lol thats not a c++ problem. Cpp is different lang than python. If u don't have experience with c++ stop complaining about it. And regarding developer experience it doesn't matter if end consumer are going to get slow bloated app which need python runtime to be installed lol.

I do have experience. It's my main language and my current job. C++ really sucks to work with for a developer even with types.

For building cloud services where apps are bottlenecked by the database, the user experience is roughly the same as C++ but the developer experience with python is much much much more easier.

This attitude where consumers have to run the apps or install a runtime to run the app on there personal machines is much more rare nowadays.

Re: Does C++ still deserve a bad rap?

#180

Post by chromatin »

pdimitar wrote: post #148

I have nothing against C++ per se. Used it on and off for 10 years (but most actively 3). It's a fine language. To me using C++ means you are ready to give up a lot of time and energy in order to gain a complete control over certain aspects of your program. I was very much into that at the start of my career and gradually started drifting away to more immediate productivity while reserving the right to poke under the…

I general I agree with your broader point about when to select dynamic language, flow state etc., and specifically with C, C++, Rust (although of those I haven’t done C++ in years except to tweak others’ code). However I find D can be written in a very script like manner, using the GC. Only when chasing performance do I need to go GC-free. The fast compilation means I can iterate as fast as python, and it has replaced a lot of python in our group.

Side note,I would like to learn OCaml and am interested you drew a distinction between Haskell (former group) and OCaml (latter group).

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