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Debunking C++ Myths

Debunking C++ Myths

By : Alexandru Bolboacă, Ferenc-Lajos Deák
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Debunking C++ Myths

Debunking C++ Myths

By: Alexandru Bolboacă, Ferenc-Lajos Deák

Overview of this book

Think you know C++? Think again. For decades, C++ has been clouded by myths and misunderstandings—from its early design decisions to misconceptions that still linger today. Claims like "C++ is too hard to learn" or "C++ is obsolete" are often rooted in some truth, but they are outdated and fail to capture the language’s ongoing evolution and modern capabilities. Written by industry veterans with over 40 years of combined experience, this book uncovers the myths, exploring their origins and relevance in the context of today’s C++ landscape. It equips you with a deeper understanding of advanced features and best practices to elevate your projects. Each chapter tackles a specific misconception, shedding light on C++'s modern features, such as smart pointers, lambdas, and concurrency. You’ll learn practical strategies to navigate common challenges like code portability and compiler compatibility, as well as how to incorporate modern best practices into your C++ codebase to optimize performance and future-proof your projects. By the end of this book, you’ll have a comprehensive understanding of C++'s evolution, equipping you to make informed decisions and harness its powerful features to enhance your skills, coding practices, and projects.
Table of Contents (15 chapters)
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The dark orders of C++

There is one dark corner of the C++ language that is rarely touched by sunlight, and if a piece of code from these depths surfaces by any chance, a gang of hardcore developers immediately jumps on it and refactors it into digestible bits and bytes. Let’s consider, for example, the very simple case of why the a[2] and 2[a] expressions are equivalent when in C++, and a is an array of objects:

int main() {
    int a[16] = {0};
    a[2] = 3;
    3[a] = 4;
}

The preceding piece of code, despite the fact that it looks ugly, actually compiles. The reason is the following: in C++, the operator [] array subscript is defined in terms of pointer arithmetic. The a[i] expression is translated by the compiler into *(a + i), where a is a pointer to the first element of the array and i is the index. The i[a] expression at the end is also translated to the *(i + a) expression, where i is the index and a is...

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