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Why C and C++ are Awful Programming Languages

radford.edu

3 points by albertoCaroM 5 years ago · 2 comments

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linkdd 5 years ago

A very opinionated article that likes to forget what C was (an assembly language with a better syntax) and what C++ was (C with classes).

The examples are dubious and won't ever make their way to production code.

It also seems that the author just discovered that they are low-level languages. I've never found any serious book on the subject claiming the opposite.

  • albertoCaroMOP 5 years ago

    I agree with you it's a very opinionated article but despite I program every single day on C and C++, I agree with some points he claims. For example, I think the implicit conversions in C++ it's very problematic. Another point is regarding undefined behaviors they still surprise me.

    Even I agree with the part in he complains about the size and complexity of the c++ standard.

    And the third footnote is simply true.

    My complaints are more oriented to C++ than C, often I feel that something went wrong, and we fail to try to reduce the complexity.

    When I remember the following quote "A programming language is low level when its programs require attention to the irrelevant." Alan J. Pelis. I always remember modern C++ and I realized how regardless of an apparently simpler syntax, we start to think about l-value, r-value discard, contexpr, we start paying attention to details no related to our original problem.

    That's why I feel you are right C++ is a low-level language, but sometimes I feel the modern C++ is not a higher level, but even a lower level.

    Sometimes I ask myself if despite the lack of standard library and high-level structures if working with c and Glibc it's higher or lower level, my experience tells me that sometimes I can concentrate better on my problem I try to solve, instead of struggle with the compiler.

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