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Demise of C++?

Posted by Hemos on from the reports-of-my-death-have-greatly.h dept.

fashla writes "Several somber and soul searching threads have been recently posted to the USENET newsgroup comp.lang.c++ such as "C++ is Dead" and "A Dying Era". The reason for this reflective mood is the sudden demise of the magazine C/C++ Users Journal (CUJ) http://www.cuj.com/ that had been published by CMP Media. Participating in the posts have been such C++ luminaries such as Bjarne Stroustrup and P.J. Plauger. While some contributers think that CUJ's demise is due to the general trend away from print, others think something else is afoot..."

2 of 271 comments (clear)

  1. Balkanization by (1+-sqrt(5))*(2**-1) · · Score: 5, Interesting
    We're witnessing, I believe, the Balkanization of the software industry, where hybrids like C++ are being edged out; the ultimate trend: C where speed counts, and, for everything else, Java.

    Though it were hard for me to imagine, for instance, Unreal's engine being ported to Java, Quake seems to have fared well with feral C.

  2. Re:C++ has its place by LizardKing · · Score: 5, Interesting

    C++ remains as the only proper object-oriented language. Despite all the years of continuous development in languages, there has yet arisen an overall better object-oriented language. Yes it's ugly. Yes it's cryptic. Yes, it explodes often. But there isn't another language that does things better.

    C++ the "only proper object oriented language"?!? It started life as a kludged on Modula extension to C. It has evolved into an overly complex language that includes elements of many programming paradigms, but implements all but the procedural ones poorly. The procedural stuff came from C anyway. Objective C is far closer to a "proper" object-oriented language, adding the minimum to C to give it OOP features. Smalltalk itself is the purest OOP language.

    Java - Oh wow, a language that inherited the syntax from C++. Also completely controlled by a useless business committee. Tack on the JVM and you have yourself a C++ killer! Oh wait...

    It inherited procedural syntax from C, not C++. The OOP aspects were inherited from Objective C and SmallTalk, along with a class library that owes much to NeXTstep/OpenStep. Gosling and other Sun engineers must have been exposed to NeXT's development platform during the brief Sun dalliance with OpenStep. As for being controlled by a "business" committee, my experience of Java's evolution is that it was largely driven byb engineers at Sun. Anyway, Stroustrup and the ISO committees haven't done a great job with C++.

    As for being a C++ killer, it seems to be exactly that at my current employer. Our content delivery systems have been rewritten in Java and C, replacing a C++ monstrosity. Our only outsourced application is in the process of being rewritten in Java rather to replace the current C++ version from the same vendor. C++ ain't just dying, it's dead here.

    C# - Like Java, but worse. Switch the Java committee for a Microsoft one. Switch JVM for .NET. Stupidity for everyone!

    Although it's just Java for Windows, C# is a much more elegant language than C++.

    Objective-C - Is it used ever outside of Apple development?

    Why's that, doesn't development for MacOS X amount to much then? Plus, the Cocoa APIs are far more elegant than the hideous STL abomination.

    Smalltalk - Nice and pretty. And unheard of outside of the niche.

    It was ahead of it's time, but obscurity doesn't mean it's a poorer language than C++.

    Python, Ruby, etc. - Often considered too slow.

    Only in urban myths.