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Me neither. I have some very smart friends who think it's the perfect language, but I kind of prefer almost every language that has come out after C++. I feel

by tombert 5mo ago

Me neither. I have some very smart friends who think it's the perfect language, but I kind of prefer almost every language that has come out after C++. I feel like the language adds some very strange semantics in some very strange places that can be hard to reason about until you've spent a lot of time with the language. This wouldn't necessarily be so bad if not for the fact that most people who write C++ have not spent sufficient time to understand it (and I consider myself in that group, though I don't write C++). I have mixed feelings on D, but I'm very grateful that Rust came along. Rust is arguably even more complicated than C++, but the good thing is that getting a lot of these complications wrong will simply not allow your code to compile. It's a huge pain in the ass at first but I've become grateful for it. I still write C very occasionally, but Rust has supplanted like 95% of jobs that were formerly C. I still really need to play with Zig.

eska 5mo ago
Sounds like you would appreciate this talk: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wo84LFzx5nI&pp=ygUSVGhlIGJpZyBvb3BzIGNhc2V5 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wo84LFzx5nI&pp=ygUSVGhlIGJpZyB... Personally I use C or something, anything other than C++ really, if I need something more ergonomic or provably correct. Many excuse C++’s design history with “they didn’t know better”, but the oft forgotten history explained in that video shows otherwise.
- tombert 5mo ago
  I haven't played with Zig yet, but it does look like what I want C++ to be; something unapologetically low level but given some high-level constructs for safety and ergonomics. I haven't had a huge impetus to learn it because Rust has been happily occupying that space for me but it certainly can't hurt to play with Zig. I should write an Ffmpeg codec with it or something this weekend to try it out.
  - sufficientsoup 5mo ago
    I've been having fun trying out Zig recently; would recommend. FYI that they released a big batch of API changes in April (version 0.16.0) so be mindful of learning from old resources.
foobarian 5mo ago
Would you say Rust is more complicated than C++, or just harder to write? I think that complication a la C++ where there are too many features for the language's own good is a different problem than being a clean language but with higher order features that require a bit more, I don't know, focus?
- tombert 5mo ago
  I think there are certainly different complications in Rust than C++. The RAII can be roughly the same in the naive sense, but there's having to worry about Send and Sync and Pin and fighting with the borrow checker and all that fun stuff. Gauging how "complicated" a language is somewhat subjective, so it's kind of hard for me to give a straightforward answer. I think it's certainly easier to be (some definition of) productive with C++ than with Rust. I feel like to do anything even remotely non-trivial with Rust, you kind of have to understand everything, because if you don't do it in the "Rust way", it often won't compile. I think this is a good thing, but it does make it harder to get started. C++ has a lot less consistency and (kind of) more features, and lots of strange semantics to go with those features, and so if people actually use them it can get confusing and hard to read pretty quickly. My knowledge is a bit out of date, to be clear; previously whenever I need something in the C++ domain, I could fairly easily just reach for C and use that instead. Now Rust is available and I think overall better (though I do sometimes miss how utterly simple and dumb C is).
  - foobarian 5mo ago
    > have to understand everything, because if you don't do it in the "Rust way", it often won't compile I confess I haven't dug into it much yet, but this reminds me of how Haskell was. By the time you got a program to compile your project was more or less done.
    - cratermoon 5mo ago
      Rust is similar. I don't have a link handy, but I've read a few articles noting experience with programming in rust where a program that compiles works. Provided the logic is correct, of course.

by tombert 5mo ago

eska 5mo ago

Sounds like you would appreciate this talk: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wo84LFzx5nI&pp=ygUSVGhlIGJpZyBvb3BzIGNhc2V5 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wo84LFzx5nI&pp=ygUSVGhlIGJpZyB... Personally I use C or something, anything other than C++ really, if I need something more ergonomic or provably correct. Many excuse C++’s design history with “they didn’t know better”, but the oft forgotten history explained in that video shows otherwise.

tombert 5mo ago
I haven't played with Zig yet, but it does look like what I want C++ to be; something unapologetically low level but given some high-level constructs for safety and ergonomics. I haven't had a huge impetus to learn it because Rust has been happily occupying that space for me but it certainly can't hurt to play with Zig. I should write an Ffmpeg codec with it or something this weekend to try it out.
- sufficientsoup 5mo ago
  I've been having fun trying out Zig recently; would recommend. FYI that they released a big batch of API changes in April (version 0.16.0) so be mindful of learning from old resources.

foobarian 5mo ago

Would you say Rust is more complicated than C++, or just harder to write? I think that complication a la C++ where there are too many features for the language's own good is a different problem than being a clean language but with higher order features that require a bit more, I don't know, focus?

tombert 5mo ago
I think there are certainly different complications in Rust than C++. The RAII can be roughly the same in the naive sense, but there's having to worry about Send and Sync and Pin and fighting with the borrow checker and all that fun stuff. Gauging how "complicated" a language is somewhat subjective, so it's kind of hard for me to give a straightforward answer. I think it's certainly easier to be (some definition of) productive with C++ than with Rust. I feel like to do anything even remotely non-trivial with Rust, you kind of have to understand everything, because if you don't do it in the "Rust way", it often won't compile. I think this is a good thing, but it does make it harder to get started. C++ has a lot less consistency and (kind of) more features, and lots of strange semantics to go with those features, and so if people actually use them it can get confusing and hard to read pretty quickly. My knowledge is a bit out of date, to be clear; previously whenever I need something in the C++ domain, I could fairly easily just reach for C and use that instead. Now Rust is available and I think overall better (though I do sometimes miss how utterly simple and dumb C is).
- foobarian 5mo ago
  > have to understand everything, because if you don't do it in the "Rust way", it often won't compile I confess I haven't dug into it much yet, but this reminds me of how Haskell was. By the time you got a program to compile your project was more or less done.
  - cratermoon 5mo ago
    Rust is similar. I don't have a link handy, but I've read a few articles noting experience with programming in rust where a program that compiles works. Provided the logic is correct, of course.