Core C++, 7 and 8 of N: Loops, ODR, and variadic array sorter

By Blog Staff | Feb 5, 2013 11:31 AM | Tags: intermediate advanced

Two advanced talks by Stephan T. Lavavej (aka STL) are now available, the second being posted today:

Core C++, 7 of N

In Part 7, STL teaches us about Usual Arithmetic Conversions, Template Metaprogramming (TMP), and shares some of the Visual C++ STL internal implementation (some of it not yet released). Many of you have asked for some treatment of TMP and STL delivers!

Core C++, 8 of N

In part 8, STL digs into the do-while loop, casts, one definition rule (ODR), and his variadic template array sorter. There is a lot of information in this episode, so get comfortable, tune in, and learn.

C++ Concurrency - Herb Sutter

By Blog Staff | Jan 8, 2013 01:42 PM | Tags: intermediate

Another C++ and Beyond 2012 talk is now available online on Channel 9.

[Ed.: Note that the talk title and abstract should read as below. The initial Channel 9 video posting used an outdated title and abstract, and will be corrected soon.]

C++ and Beyond 2012: C++ Concurrency

by Herb Sutter

Herb says:

I've spoken and written on these topics before. Here's what's different about this talk:

 

• Brand new: This material goes beyond what I've written and taught about before in my Effective Concurrency articles and courses.
• Cutting-edge current: It covers the best-practices state of the art techniques and shipping tools, and what parts of that are standardized in C++11 already (the answer to that one may surprise you!) and what's en route to near-term standardization and why, with coverage of the latest discussions.
• Blocking vs. non-blocking: What's the difference between blocking and non-blocking styles, why on earth would you care, which kinds does C++11 support, and how are we looking at rounding it out in C++1y?

The answers all matter to you – even the ones not yet in the C++ standard – because they are real, available in shipping products, and affect how you design your software today.

C++ and Beyond 2012: Panel - Convincing your Colleagues

By Blog Staff | Jan 4, 2013 06:57 AM | Tags: basics

A new C++ and Beyond 2012 panel is now available:

C++ and Beyond 2012: Panel - Convincing your Colleagues

From C++ and Beyond 2012, Andrei, Herb and Scott present Convincing Your Colleagues - an interactive panel.

Abstract:

You can't do a better job if you don't change what you're doing, but change is hard.  It's especially hard when what needs to change is your colleagues' approach to software development. Moving your team forward often requires persuading your peers to change their behavior, sometimes to do something they're not doing, other times to stop doing something they've become accustomed to.  Whether the issue is to embrace or avoid C++ language features, to adopt new development tools or abandon old ones, to increase use of or scale back on overuse of design patterns, to adhere to coding standards, or any of the plethora of other matters that affect software creation, moving things forward typically requires getting your colleagues to buy into the change you're proposing.  But how can you do that?

In this panel session, Andrei, Herb, and Scott share how they go about convincing their colleagues to change and take questions from the audience.

You Don't Know const and mutable -- Herb Sutter

By Blog Staff | Dec 31, 2012 11:13 AM | Tags: intermediate

In August, Herb Sutter gave a brand new 30-min talk at C++ and Beyond where he laid out the fundamentally new meanings of two long-time C++ keywords:

You Don't Know [const] and [mutable]

Herb Sutter

There’s a major change in C++11 that [...] rewrites pre-C++11 design guidance and is directly related to writing solid code in a concurrent and parallel world. And it isn’t just academic — everyone is going to have to learn and apply the new C++11 guidance that we’ll cover in this session.

This is a great example of how C++11 is a simpler language: We can stop the Cold War-era waffling about subtleties about what 20th-century C++ const means, and proudly declare modern C++ const has the simple and natural and "obvious" meaning that most people expected all along anyway.

One of the most common questions after the talk was, "Do other C++ experts agree with Herb's conclusions?" The answer is yes -- regarding his upcoming The C++ Programming Language, Fourth Edition, Bjarne Stroustrup writes: "I do point out that const means immutable and absence of race conditions in the last Tour chapter. I plan more for the concurrency chapter." Look for the third Tour chapter to be posted here next week, and the aforementioned last Tour chapter to be posted here in early February.

Enjoy.

Best of 2012: Clang @ GoingNative -- Chandler Carruth

By Blog Staff | Dec 24, 2012 10:04 AM | Tags: None

As we're all unwinding at the end of the year, your blog staff would like to recommend watching again one of the year's most hilariously entertaining and deeply informative talks about the world's hottest new C++ compiler -- a holiday video that's genuinely fun:

Clang: Defending C++ from Murphy's Million Monkeys

by Chandler Carruth
at GoingNative 2012

[... Clang] provides fantastic diagnostics, static and dynamic program analysis, advanced rewriting and refactoring functionality, and language extensibility. Together with improvements to the language in C++11 these help programmers cope with today's code and write better code tomorrow. Clang also makes it easier than ever before to evolve and evaluate new language features and extensions to make C++ itself better.

Through this talk I'll give some background on the Clang compiler, what it does today to make writing C++ better, and how we're using it to help shape the C++ language going forward.

Even your non-technical family and friends will probably enjoy the first five minutes.

Thanks again to Chandler, GoingNative, and Channel 9 for an engaging and illuminating presentation.

Three Optimization Tips for C++ -- Andrei Alexandrescu

By Joel Lamotte | Dec 21, 2012 01:24 PM | Tags: intermediate

For your Friday viewing pleasure, from the always-engaging master, Andrei Alexandrescu:

Three Optimization Tips for C++ (video) (PDF slides)

Andrei Alexandrescu

Facebook NYC, December 4, 2012

 

From an early slide in the talk: "Intuition:

• Ignores aspects of a complex reality
• Makes narrow/wrong/obsolete assumptions

[...]

• The only good intuition: "I should time this."

​Enjoy.

(Bonus: The tips are also applicable in other languages. They just happen to be easier to use and control in C++.)

Bjarne Stroustrup interview: From the Foundation and C++11, to portability and the C++ resurgence

By Blog Staff | Dec 17, 2012 09:01 AM | Tags: basics

Last Monday, Bjarne Stroustrup gave a live interview to David Intersimone of Embarcadero to kick off their CodeRage 7 conference. Bjarne discusss the new Standard C++ Foundation, the ISO C++11 standard, new language features, how C++11 builds on C++’s strengths, application portability, and C++’s ubiquitous presence in the markets.

The video is now on YouTube. Enjoy.

5min QuickVid: Bjarne Stroustrup on "What inspired you to create C++?"

By Blog Staff | Dec 14, 2012 10:54 AM | Tags: None

On BigThink: C++ creator Bjarne Stroustrup talks about why he made the programming language and  elaborates on the process of how C++ came to be.

Bjarne Stroustrup on Creating Code for Everyone

Stroustrup takes five minutes to answer:

• What inspired you to create C++?
• What makes C++ such a widely used language?

Value Semantics and Concepts-Based Polymorphism -- Sean Parent

By Eric Niebler | Dec 13, 2012 10:50 AM | Tags: advanced

This past year at C++Now, Sean Parent gave a talk about Value Types that blew the room away. It will deepen your understanding of the design of the STL and change the way you think about and write code. He'll also show you some lean-and-mean image-processing demos that will drop your jaw. This is why we do C++.

Value Semantics and Concepts-Based Polymorphism

by Sean Parent

Sean will further develop the Value Semantics and Concepts-based Polymorphism concepts covered in his keynote, "Now What? A vignette in 3 parts."

Note: The audio is soft. Turn your volume up. The slides, the Keynote presentation, and the source code can be found in C++Now's GitHub repo here.

Watch the video...

Using C++11 to Speed Up Your Qt 5 Programs -- Marc Mutz

By Blog Staff | Dec 12, 2012 11:41 AM | Tags: None

Last month's Qt DeveloperDays Europe videos are now available, including this one showing continued rapid adoption of C++11.

Using C++11 to Speed Up Your Qt 5 Programs (PDF slides)

Marc Mutz

Qt 5 comes with much-improved support for C++11. This talk will teach you techniques that you can use to make your applications use less memory or execute faster when compiled with a C++11 compiler. The focus is on techniques that will not break compatibility with C++98 compilers. After a look at the present state of C++11 support in Qt 5.0, the talk closes with a look at what we can expect in Qt 5.1.

From the summary slide "C++11 @ QT 5.0":

• constexpr added to many types
• move semantics added to a few types
• initializer_list added to most types
• new few N-ary ctors marked explicit, N >= 2
• = delete used almost ubiquitously
• noexcept added in a few central places