Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#41

Post by nickpsecurity » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:52 PM UTC

tokenrove wrote: post #20

To answer the titular question: I hate C++ because I worked in it for 10 years, and I came to realize things could be otherwise. I almost came back to the language with C++11, but its core problem remains the same: the only maintainable codebases seem to be those strictly ruled over by language experts with an iron fist -- and too many people think they're experts (hint: if you haven't read the language standards (or…

I thought BLISS was just a macro language. Why do you count it as a systems language?

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#42

Post by joeld42 » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 5:52 PM UTC

Because it adds complexity, but doesn't deliver the gains in productivity or encapsulations that you hope for.

C++ is a big language, and most people agree that "some parts" of it are useful, but they just can't agree on which parts are the good ones. You have to decide that for yourself.

This is worth reading for a good suggestion of how to use C++ features sparingly:

"Orthodox C++" https://gist.github.com/bkaradzic/2e39896bc7d8c34e042b

Everyone has their own opinions, from dogmatically never use anything c++ to only stopping short of using boost. I will vary by project, using STL sometimes and not others, sometimes using classes lightly, other times sticking to POD, etc. I think you have the right idea when you say "Use it to get what you need done".

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#43

Post by Jtsummers » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 5:59 PM UTC

nickpsecurity wrote: post #41

tokenrove wrote: post #20

To answer the titular question: I hate C++ because I worked in it for 10 years, and I came to realize things could be otherwise. I almost came back to the language with C++11, but its core problem remains the same: the only maintainable codebases seem to be those strictly ruled over by language experts with an iron fist -- and too many people think they're experts (hint: if you haven't read the language standards (or…

I thought BLISS was just a macro language. Why do you count it as a systems language?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLISS

It included a macro facility, but it was also a full-blown systems programming language.

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#44

Post by nickpsecurity » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 7:38 PM UTC

Jtsummers wrote: post #43

nickpsecurity wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought BLISS was just a macro language. Why do you count it as a systems language?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLISS It included a macro facility, but it was also a full-blown systems programming language.

I'll be darned. Whole time I've seen it in VMS-related material I thought it was just a pre-processor for ASM or something. Turns out it was a sort if C competitor. Thanks for the tip. :)

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#45

Post by Jtsummers » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 7:46 PM UTC

nickpsecurity wrote: post #44

Jtsummers wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLISS It included a macro facility, but it was also a full-blown systems programming language.

I'll be darned. Whole time I've seen it in VMS-related material I thought it was just a pre-processor for ASM or something. Turns out it was a sort if C competitor. Thanks for the tip. :)

No problem. I'm trying to remember when I first learned about it. I want to say it was a compilers (?) course in grad school. The professor was lamenting that C had survived and BLISS had disappeared, led me to research it originally. I particularly like that everything (or nearly everything) is an expression, probably due to my affinity for functional programming languages. Beyond that, I'm not sure that I like it's typeless nature for doing systems programming work. I guess it depends on how low-level you're talking about, though.

EDIT: I recall reading more about BLISS back then, but that was a decade ago. This [0], linked in the Wikipedia article, is pretty interesting. I'm about 5 pages in and have to head out so I'll finish it later, but it seems like something you'd be interested in given your general interest in language history (from reading your posts in the past).

[0] http://www.cs.tufts.edu/~nr/cs257/archive/ronald-brender/bli...

Re: Why does everyone here seem to dislike C++?

#46

Post by burfog » Sat, Jun 04, 2016, 2:50 AM UTC

jerven wrote: post #31

There is only one thing "wrong" with C++ and that is undefined behavior. An accident of history, but one that will make you cry at times. For the rest the tooling around it is quite depressing as well. But none of this prevents you from getting great work done, they are annoyances. i.e. you can have a solid career with C++ so the languages to learn are suggestions for horizon expansion not career advice. Now it looks…

Ada was held back by super-expensive compilers. This was the natural result of Ada being required by military contracts. You paid, or you didn't get the job done.

Free compilers are available now, along with free RTOSes that support an Ada runtime. The language seems to be growing in popularity again, partly because of the free compilers and partly because of a renewed interest in security.