EPISODE · Dec 19, 2019 · 57 MIN
We Almost Always Get the Default Wrong
from cpp.chat · host Jon Kalb & Phil Nash
This week we chat with Vittorio Romeo about the pros and cons of backwards compatibility in C++, and his proposal to get the best of both worlds: Epochs. As well as language compatibility, we also discuss _ABI_ compatibility - why breaking these things is such a problem, but how _not_ breaking them is increasingly becoming a problem. We also, finally, get an answer to the age of question of, 'how many programmers does it take to change a lightbulb?'
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This week we chat with Vittorio Romeo about the pros and cons of backwards compatibility in C++, and his proposal to get the best of both worlds: Epochs. As well as language compatibility, we also discuss ABI compatibility - why breaking these things is such a problem, but how not breaking them is increasingly becoming a problem. We also, finally, get an answer to the age of question of, "how many programmers does it take to change a lightbulb?" Links: Vittorio's CppCon talk on epochs p1881 - The Epochs Proposal- Epochs: a backward-compatible language evolution mechanism p1863 - ABI Break- Titus Winters' paper on the ABI compatibility issue SPECS- A Modest Proposal: C++ Resyntaxed
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We Almost Always Get the Default Wrong
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