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Boost 1.36 Released
AndrewStephens writes "Good news for C++ programmers: Boost 1.36 has been released with 4 new libraries (including very useful exception templates) and a host of updates. In particular, boost.asio (the cross platform AsyncIO library) has seen major additions and now supports asynchronous disk operations on Windows. Almost every modern C++ codebase uses Boost somewhere, and many of its features find their way into the official language specifications."
I use C++ and Boost and like them. But it's a love-hate relationship. I mostly found the trolls to be insightful because they reflected that love-hate.
C++ is a great programming language in the sense that English is a great natural language. Undesigned, piecemeal, weird idioms, and a pig to learn. But expressive, powerful, portable. Boost plays the role of "the King's English" -- it's a style guide. Sometimes arguable, sometimes wrong, but mostly very good at pointing out how to avoid deficiencies in the language. C, C#, Delphi, Objective C, OCaml, Mathematica and Python are unquestionably better languages than C++. And Esperanto is better than English. But I speak English and use C++ because it does what I need it to do better than any of the alternatives.
Dealing with geeks is a problem for management to deal with. C++ is probably rightly the domain of ubergeeks. If you choose to use C++ because it suits your needs and your geeks like a bit of mental masturbation, good for you. No matter what language you use, your local geeks will push the boundaries. With C++, Boost mitigates the damage your geeks might cause when pushing boundaries (e.g. template metaprogramming). Boost is therefore a tool for managing geeks.
The biggest problem with C++ and Boost is also their biggest asset. The language is too plastic. Every new library, object or template comes with a domain-specific-language that you just have to learn. For example, using functors to create threads. That is counter-intuitive and hard. But with Boost, each domain-specific-language tends to be well designed, so that if you understand C++, then Boost will push you into using the features in a way that is portable and safe.
But an overwhelming gripe is that the online documentation is atrocious. In the sense of incomplete, unclear, impenetrable, useless examples, broken links, broken HTML, outdated. To the point where it becomes a good reason not to use Boost.