4 ms·

Been away from C++ a long time. If picking it up again, is it better to just start with C++17 or 20 or stick to C++11 which seems to be the defacto production

• gumby 7y ago
  Depends on your needs. If you don't have a lot of or any legacy code yes, go straight to c++17 (or even 20 though you won't be able to use many of the features right out of a the gate, or without third-party libraries). If you can do this you'll be glad you did. I was able to start a project in c++17 in 2016, though at the time I had to use boost::variant with the Xcode compiler and boost::filesystem for all three compilers (only a limited use so I could even have skipped it). Also for some complex third party libraries I had to make a little trampoline file that compiled in C++14, or with special flags, and then call those entry points. Since I was starting from a blank slate I also compiled everything with pretty much maximal warnings an -Werror which really improved the code a lot, something you can never get away with with legacy code (not to insult working legacy codebases!)
• kllrnohj 7y ago
  C++11 was the major version bump. It changed how you're supposed to write C++. C++14 & 17 are just minor fixes & improvements. So there's really no reason to not start with at least C++17.