My advice on implementing stuff in C:
My advice on implementing stuff in C:
Posted Oct 15, 2010 20:29 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129)In reply to: My advice on implementing stuff in C: by chad.netzer
Parent article: Russell: On C Library Implementation
I assert that "low level programming" is *not* what C++ is about. Modern C++ style recommends that you use smart pointers, rather than C pointers, for example.
How does that make the language any less "low level"? A smart pointer just automates stuff you'd normally do by hand (i. e. free resources or decrement a reference counter). It's just as efficient
Nor should you be using C strings, C arrays, C structures, C stdlib functions, C-like error handling, C macros, etc. Basically, modern C++ encourages using full high-level abstractions for data structures and algorithms, and is thus, fundamentally, high-level.
The use of C arrays isn't discouraged because they're "low-level", but because there are better alternatives. std::tr1::array is just as low-level-ish as a C array, it does't do bounds checking or anything fancy, and it's just as efficient. The difference is that it offers the interface of an STL container, allowing you to use STL algorithms with it.
The same basically applies to C macros. The MAX(x,y) macro kind of works, but std::max(x,y) works better. It'll complain if x and y are not of the same type, and it won't evaluate its arguments more than once. std::max isn't somehow higher-level than MAX, it just sucks less.
Some things in C++ actually raise the level of abstraction, for example with std::string you don't have to worry about memory allocation any longer, since the class will do it for you when needed. If you can't afford that, nobody is going to blame you for not using it. C++ was deliberately designed not to force some style of programming on the user, be it a high or a low level one (unlike C, which forces you to program on a low level of abstraction all the time).