Disclaimer
I have never been a big fan of C++ coming from C and Java. C is a nice little language and yet offers many means of code structuring. Java offers many object-oriented features and makes the use of them quite easy. Together with garbage collection, a huge ecosystem and powerful IDEs it lets you work on the problem at hand at quite some speed. C++ on the other hand is a huge language with myriads of concepts and supports almost all features of C. So at first it seemed to me as worst of all worlds. Similar to Scala which is also a quite large multi-paradigm language (that I happen to like).
Why and how use C++ then?
On my job I have to work with C++ regularily. Diving deeper into the language, learning STL and modern code styles I am starting to actually like C++. In addition to the runtime-efficiency (that you can get with C too, and to some extent even with Java) C++ provides many means for robust programs and nice abstractions. Using idioms like RAII, the Algorithms library, smart pointers and operating mostly on values takes away most of the resource management and memory buffer handling hassle. But since C++ is so large and supports so many programming styles I think the following measures really help to build robust and maintainable programs and enjoy using C++:
- Establish rules for your code, e.g. no naked pointer, no friend, no multiple inheritance, use of exceptions etc. That way you create an idyllic world where you develop most of the time and the number of pitfalls is greatly reduced. Your rules may change like you see them fit but adhere to them and do not change them lightly.
- Protect your code from legacy/3rd party code and libraries using anti-corruption layers, wrappers and adapters. They are means to preserve your idyllic world and make life there easier. Don’t let the null pointers slip in.
- Use modern idioms and APIs, as modern as your compiler/environment supports them (see gcc c++11 support, Visual Studio etc.). Like in other programming environments take special care regarding your dependencies! Manage them carefully.
- Understand and learn to use STL containers, smart pointers, RAII, algorithm, streams etc. There are plethora of concise, clear and robust solutions for your everyday problems without the need of iterating over vectors with and index variable…
- Build classes/components that manage their resources and provide easy to use interfaces. Use type-rich interfaces and work mostly with values. The compiler will help you a lot more than with a pointer-heavy and mostly primitives style. Treat delete (outside of a destructor) and naked new as smells and restrict them to areas where you cannot find a way around them.
Where is the fun for me?
I find it rewarding and satisfying carefully crafting these easy-to-use components and improving them over time. Adding some const statements, deciding between pass-by-value or pass-by-reference, making the components thread-safe, finding the right balance between using classes or free floating functions, private inheritance etc. You can really do a lot have the compiler as a friend instead of a dreaded enemy and let it guarantee many things programmers tend to do wrong. Build your components so that they are hard to use in a wrong way. Then there are really cool features like call_once library support, closures (aka lambda functions) and type inference with the auto keyword, user-defined literals and many more.
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