C++ (was RE: Python suitability)

[James Logajan]

Alex Martelli attempts to ignite a flame war:
> I'm not surprised that a Python enthusiast may not appreciate
> C++'s basic underlying philosophy, since it's so close in many
> surprising respects to Perl's -- reading Larry Wall's musings on
> his language, and Stroustrup's on his own, side by side, can
> be very enlightening in this respect, more than the huge surface
> differences between Perl and C++ might lead one to expect.

This would explain why the syntax of Perl and C++ suck equally and yet so
differently. But Stroustrup at least had a glimmer of a philosophy. Wall had
none.

> One key difference is that, in C++, you _can_ design and
> maintain huge and flexible projects -- the language does not
> hinder, and gives you almost all the tools you need for that
> ("almost": it misses language-level, standard support for such
> key packaging/deployment issues such as packaging into
> separate "libraries", threading and IPC issues, network
> access, GUIs, DBs -- you have to turn to other standards
> for these; on the plus side, C++, having no built-in idea of
> how any of those should work, will never hinder you from
> integrating with any other existing architecture you may need).
> 
> C++ does not _constrain_ you to do your homework, and
> design (and design _well_) -- it does not even really make
> any serious attempts at so constraining -- letting you do
> just about anything means giving you by far "enough rope
> to shoot yourself in the foot".  This means most developers
> are NOT suited for the language (or vice-versa:-), because
> they lack the professional discipline, or the skill to apply it
> successfully, for the kind of projects for which C++ makes
> sense (either HUGE ones, or ones with really, TRULY tight
> constraints of performance, where every microsecond
> does matter).

I'm sorry, but drop the "++" and you could have made these same arguments
two decades ago about C. You sure you didn't cut and paste this from
something 20 years old and add some plus signs?