“Most people don’t use C++ anywhere near as well as it could be used.”

Question: What advice do you have for C++ developers?

Bjarne Stroustrup: Most people don’t use C++ anywhere near as well as it could be used.  There are still a lot of people that are trying to use it as a glorified C, or as a slightly mutated Java or SmallTalk, and that’s not the right way of using it.  Go back, read one good book and see if you are up to date or if you happen to be stuck in the '80s or '90s.  We can do much better.  And then, next year, C++ OX will arrive, the next generation of C++ and it’ll support some of the modern programming styles that has been proven useful over the last decade or so—significantly better than C++ 98, which was the previous standard.  And so learn a little bit about it, look at what has been done and try to understand why it was done.  Things are just about to get much better.

Recorded August 12, 2010

Interviewed by Max Miller