Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!psuvax1!rutgers!att!cbnewsl!dog
From: dog@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (edward.n.schiebel)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: Should we use C++?
Message-ID: <2211@cbnewsl.ATT.COM>
Date: 11 Oct 89 11:58:55 GMT
References: <17898@rphroy.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 49

From article <17898@rphroy.UUCP>, by tkacik@rphroy.UUCP (Tom Tkacik):
> We are starting a large software project, and are considering using C++
> as the implementation language.  It is expected that this will be used by
> many people, and will have to be maintained by different people, on several
> different systems.
> 
> Is C++ ready for use yet?
YES!

>  I have heard of several different versions of C++.
> AT&T C++ ver. 1.2,  AT&T C++ ver. 2.0,  g++-1.35, Zortech C++, etc.
> and that there are differences between them.
The latest and most up-to-date is AT&T's Releasee 2.0.  FSF's g++ is
right there too, but deviates from the specifications in the C++ 
Reference Manual in a few ways.

> 
> I am questioning the stability of C++.  How much further change will there be?
> Should we go ahead and use the C++ 1.2 that we got from our vendor?
> Should we attempt to get the new version 2.0?
Definitly go for Release 2.0.
> Is g++-1.35 (or 1.36?) ready for use, and similar enough to C++2.0 that we will
> not notice the difference?
Depends on the features of g++ you use that C++ doesn't support and
visa-versa.  I wish I could give you details, but I am not intimate
with g++.
> 
> Basically, 1) are the differences between the different current versions small
> enough that code will be portable between them, and
> 2) will future changes to the language be small enough that we
> will not have to change much of the code in the future?
There are significant differences (improvements!) between C++ 1.2 and 2.0.
Use a 2.0 based product (of which g++ is a very close relative).

A short anecdote:
I attended the Usenix C++ Workshop in Santa Fe to gear myself up for a
new project we were going to write in C++.  One of the speakers presented
his view that itwould take a year to learn C++/object-oriented 
programming. Well I was distraught.  I spoke to Bjarne about this and he
agreed it would take the time BUT at the end of the year the project
would be much farther along than if we had gone with C.  I took his
advice and he was right.  We accomplished things I seriously doubt would
have been possible otherwise.

Go for it!

	Ed Schiebel
	AT&T Bell Laboratories
	dog@vilya.att.com