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by fulafel 1917 days ago
Oh we had this long before Rust, and most of C++ usage in new applications was displaced by safer (among other things) languages.

I think the biggest thing was that university curriculums and mainstream app development platforms (like Microsoft) stopped pushing it as hard when the level of horror got past a certain point. It used to be pretty bad. Business apps being written using MS "Active Template Library" in C++ and then used as signed ActiveX plugins on IE6-only web pages etc.
2 comments
smolder 1917 days ago
Safety (memory and otherwise) isn't new, but during my CS curriculum, including a course on programming language theory, there was little/no mention of techniques to ensure safety in the space between C++ and Java. I probably would have pointed toward formal verification if someone said they needed safety guarantees in the absence of garbage collection and a potentially slow or bloated runtime.

Though I believe there were some languages with features to that end, at least research languages, they weren't that well represented. I think Rust's presence brought attention to the possibilities there, and an increasing number of people see the value of investigating and developing that niche.

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pjmlp 1917 days ago
Microsoft still is the main company pushing it hard (C++ use) despite all security reports, most likely due to how the Windows and Office teams don't accept anything else.

So basically you have the DevTools and Azure teams pushing for .NET, Java and other safer languages, while Azure Sphere has a C only SDK and WinUI/UWP push C++ above anything else, with some C++ only APIs.

Politics.

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