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Is modern C++ becoming more prevalent? [closed] Ask Question

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Is modern C++ becoming more prevalent? [closed] Ask Question

When I first learned C++ 6-7 years ago, what I learned was basically "C with Classes". std::vector was definitely an advanced topic, something you could learn about if you really wanted to. And there was certainly no one telling me that destructors could be harnessed to help manage memory. Today, everywhere I look I see RAII and SFINAE and STL and Boost and, well, Modern C++. Even people who are just getting started with the language seem to be taught these concepts almost from day 1.

My question is, is this simply because I'm only seeing the "best", that is, the questions here on SO, and on other programming sites that tend to attract beginners (gamedev.net), or is this actually representative of the C++ community as a whole?

Is modern C++ really becoming the default? Rather than being some fancy thing the experts write about, is it becoming "the way C++ just is"? Or am I just unable to see the thousands of people who still learn "C with classes" and write their own dynamic arrays instead of using std::vector, and do memory management by manually calling new/delete from their top-level code?

As much as I want to believe it, it seems incredible if the C++ community as a whole has evolved so much in basically a few years. What are your experiences and impressions?

(disclaimer: Someone not familiar with C++ might misinterpret the title as asking whether C++ is gaining popularity versus other languages. That's not my question. "Modern C++" is a common name for a dialect or programming style within C++, named after the book "Modern C++ Design: Generic Programming and Design Patterns Applied", and I'm solely interested in this versus "old C++". So no need to tell me that C++'s time is past, and we should all use Python ;))

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Here's how I think things have evolved.

The first generation of C++ programmers were C programmers, who were in fact using C++ as C with classes. Plus, the STL wasn't in place yet, so that's what C++ essentially was.

When the STL came out, that advanced things, but most of the people writing books, putting together curricula, and teaching classes had learned C first, then that extra C++ stuff, so the second generation learned from that perspective. As another answer noted, if you're comfortable writing regular for loops, changing to use std::for_each doesn't buy you much except the warm fuzzy feeling that you're doing things the "modern" way.

Now, we have instructors and book writers who have been using the whole of C++, and getting their instructions from that perspective, such as Koenig & Moo's Accelerated C++ and Stroustrup's new textbook. So we don't learn char* then std::strings.

It's an interesting lesson in how long it takes for "legacy" methods to be replaced, especially when they have a track record of effectiveness.

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