I was a little bit afraid to read this one. I've glanced at some of the functional patterns in the STL — function objects, ugh — and come away shaking my head.

I was a little bit afraid to read this one. I've glanced at some of the functional patterns in the STL — function objects, ugh — and come away shaking my head. But despite my problems with C++ and/or the STL, I really appreciated this piece. The author seems to know his stuff pretty well, as there are references to Haskell, monoids, laziness, as well as a brief discussion of performance. It's probably too much to hope that this will win terribly many converts, but hey, what do I know?