• BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      136
      ·
      7 months ago

      There is no C++ allowed in the Linux kernel and Linus has gone on several major rants about how terrible a language it is.

    • Rossphorus@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      76
      ·
      7 months ago

      Torvalds just really dislikes C++. He’s gone on the record saying that he thinks it’s just not a good language. In his own words “C++ is just a waste, there is no design at all, just adding some scum on top of C.”

          • Vilian@lemmy.ca
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            8
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            7 months ago

            they dumped everything in the languaga, at least samething they needed to have right, it’s otherwise statistically impossible

          • magic_lobster_party@kbin.run
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            5
            arrow-down
            3
            ·
            edit-2
            7 months ago

            The STD is maybe the only good thing C++ has over C, and even that is awful compared to other language’s standard libraries.

            I can’t name another good thing C++ has. Maybe templates. C++’s reliance on inheritance for polymorphism is awful (should’ve gone with interfaces/traits).

            Not to mention the mess with all the different types of constructors that must always be implemented.

            It’s just a bunch of bad design choices added on top of an old outdated language.

            • acockworkorange@mander.xyz
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              3
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              7 months ago

              The STD is maybe the only good thing C++ has over C, […]. I can’t name another good thing C++ has. Maybe templates.

              Are you high? I was praising the STL, you know, the template library?

      • blind3rdeye@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        15
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        7 months ago

        I would have agreed with that before C++11. But since then, C++ has improved a lot. Its like the vision of what C++ suddenly became more clear. So I wonder if Linus would still say that today. (Unfortunately, there have been a lot of missteps in the development of C++ though, and so there is a lot of cruft that everyone wishes was not there…)

    • jalkasieni@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      53
      ·
      7 months ago

      ”C++ is a horrible language. It’s made more horrible by the fact that a lot of substandard programmers use it, to the point where it’s much much easier to generate total and utter crap with it. Quite frankly, even if the choice of C were to do nothing but keep the C++ programmers out, that in itself would be a huge reason to use C.”

      http://harmful.cat-v.org/software/c++/linus

    • raoul@lemmy.sdf.org
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      46
      arrow-down
      5
      ·
      7 months ago

      I don’t know about Linus, but the last time Reiser’s wife was seen, she was writing a c++ hello world

          • BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            12
            ·
            edit-2
            7 months ago

            Take a look at what even the proposer is saying wouldn’t be allowed in:

             (1) new and delete.  There's no way to pass GFP_* flags in.
            
             (2) Constructors and destructors.  Nests of implicit code makes the code less
                 obvious, and the replacement of static initialisation with constructor
                 calls would make the code size larger.
            
             (3) Exceptions and RTTI.  RTTI would bulk the kernel up too much and
                 exception handling is limited without it, and since destructors are not
                 allowed, you still have to manually clean up after an error.
            
             (4) Operator overloading (except in special cases).
            
             (5) Function overloading (except in special inline cases).
            
             (6) STL (though some type trait bits are needed to replace __builtins that
                 don't exist in g++).
            
             (7) 'class', 'private', 'namespace'.
            
             (8) 'virtual'.  Don't want virtual base classes, though virtual function
                 tables might make operations tables more efficient.
            

            C++ without class, constructors, destructors, most overloading and the STL? Wow.

            • ozymandias117@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              11
              ·
              7 months ago

              That doesn’t really surprise me, as most of those are the same requirements from any embedded development use case using c++ that I’ve worked on

              4 and 5 are the only ones stricter than I’m used to

              • BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                5
                ·
                7 months ago

                I’ve only worked on a few embedded systems where C++ was even an option, but they allowed 2, 4, 5, and 7. Though, for the most part most classes were simple interfaces to some sort of SPI/I2C/CAN/EtherCAT device, most of which were singletons.

      • nandeEbisu@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        7 months ago

        I don’t think its the ergonomics of the language he has an issue with. If anything C++1x probably just made the original critiques of bloat worse.

        • ozymandias117@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          14
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          7 months ago

          In that post, his critiques were around the problems with the STL and everyone using Boost. The STL has improved significantly since then, and it would be a limited subset of c++ if it was ever allowed

          There have been mailing list conversations earlier this year, citing that clang/gcc now allowing c++ in their own code might mean they’ve taken care of the issues that made it unusable for kernel code

          https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/e5949a27-999d-4b6e-8c49-3dbed32a00bc@zytor.com/

          I’m not saying it will happen, but it’s not being shot down as an absolute insanity anymore, and I wouldn’t have expected Rust to be allowed in the kernel, either

          • nandeEbisu@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            7 months ago

            Oh interesting. I didn’t realize boost was the main issue. Most people I’ve talked to were complaining about VTables introducing a bunch of indirection and people blindly using associative containers.

            • ozymandias117@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              edit-2
              7 months ago

              Vtable equivalents are used extensively in the kernel

              You’ll find structs all over the place setting them up, e.g. every driver sets up a .probe function that the core will call, since it doesn’t know what driver it’s loading

              • nandeEbisu@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                7 months ago

                Right the issue was more because they’re so easy to throw in without thinking about it so people overuse them. That may just be older devs complaining about newbies though.

    • voxel@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      27
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      7 months ago

      ”C++ is a horrible language. It’s made more horrible by the fact that a lot of substandard programmers use it, to the point where it’s much much easier to generate total and utter crap with it. Quite frankly, even if the choice of C were to do nothing but keep the C++ programmers out, that in itself would be a huge reason to use C.”

      http://harmful.cat-v.org/software/c++/linus