I don't know how much C++ you've done, but your "Ahah! BUT WHAT ABOUT" scenario sounds exactly like virtually every C++ project I've worked on. You have N libra

I don't know how much C++ you've done, but your "Ahah! BUT WHAT ABOUT" scenario sounds exactly like virtually every C++ project I've worked on. You have N libraries, and each library has its own string class and templated array class, all with different member function names. The answer to your question is: yes. Usually you're going to do some transformation or processing when moving from one type to the other, so you just fold the conversion into that. It's stupid and you roll your eyes and you just kind of carry on.