Why is a raven like a writing desk?

For several reasons, I didn’t get a CppCon ticket this year, but since I live in the Denver metro area I did go on the Friday, which is free to attend. Herb’s closing keynote (Cpp2) was thought provoking. At one point though, he said, Think about the words and the ideas that we have been… Continue reading Monads are part of C++, and are in your code

We’ve had a couple of ways to spell functions for a long time: And we’ve had a shortcut for that second one for a while, too: (Aside: notice where [[nodiscard]] is positioned, since C++23’s P2173, to apply to the lambda’s call operator.) All these ways to spell functions look the same at the call site.… Continue reading C++23’s new function syntax

The Set-up In C++, this doesn’t work: The compiler complains, quite rightly: Despite the fact that twice_square is a constexpr function, its parameter x is not constexpr. We can’t use it in a static_assert, we can’t pass it to a template, we can’t call an immediate (consteval) function with it. So far, so well known.… Continue reading constexpr Function Parameters

A lot has already been said in the blogosphere about the use of immediately-invoked lambda expressions (IILEs) for initialization, and they’re certainly very useful. In C++20, P0428 gives us “familiar template syntax” for lambdas. Now, instead of writing a regular generic lambda: auto add = [] (auto x, auto y) { return x + y;… Continue reading Familiar Template Syntax IILEs

I’ve been programming in C++ for almost a quarter of a century now. I grew up, professionally, with C++, and in many ways, it grew up along with me. For someone who is used to C++, even used to recently-standardised C++, it’s hard not to feel apprehension when looking at C++20. Modules, coroutines, ranges, concepts… Continue reading Remember the Vasa! or, plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose

TL;DR: The C++ committee isn’t following some sort of agenda to ignore the needs of game programmers, and “modern” C++ isn’t going to become undebuggable. — Over the past week there has been an ongoing conversation on Twitter about how many people — especially those in the games industry — feel that the current direction… Continue reading Thoughts on Modern C++ and Game Dev

Note: the following applies to Microsoft’s compiler only — not to GCC or Clang. Pointers-to-member-functions (PMFs) are a bit off the beaten track in C++. They aren’t very syntactically pleasing, and they aren’t as easy to deal with as regular pointers-to-free-functions (PFFs). But they still see use, particularly in pre-C++11 codebases or where people choose… Continue reading Pointer-to-member-functions can be tricky

Last week, a little fewer than 150 C++ programmers gathered in Aspen, CO for C++Now 2018. This year the conference was scheduled before Mother’s Day, so with it being quite a bit earlier than usual, I was half-expecting snow and travel delays. In fact last week turned out to be uniformly lovely, for the most… Continue reading C++Now 2018 Trip Report

Last week in Bellevue, WA, around 1100 C++ programmers got together for CppCon. I love this conference – it’s a chance to meet up with my existing C++ community friends and make new ones, to learn new techniques and explore parts of C++, and to get excited about where C++ is headed in the next… Continue reading CppCon 2017 Trip Report