[rich_sasha]

I sort of thing the article has a point, though I disagree with the arguments. C++ 20 years ago was simple, sure. Today? I think it's on par with Rust. And both kind of have a simple core you can stick to if you like.

Saying project directory structure is complex is IMO crazy, since a fair comparison would be to general package/dependency management on C++ which is a brain explosion.

Where they do have a point is that I would hope, we can create a language that is at the same time fast, safe and simple to use. Right now we have a tradeoff triangle. Rust is safer than C++, about as fast, and arguably harder to use. Something gives.

The article absolutely has a point that C is trivial to pick up, and surely that fueled the explosion of software.

[MattPalmer1086]

C++ was not simple 20 years ago! We had template metaprogramming, and regular arguments about what subset of the language we could all agree on to safely use. Nobody understood it all even back then.

[Rochus]

Right. There were even regular puzzle columns in magazines where people had to figure out what a piece of C++ actually did. This is how template metaprogramming eventually came to light, when a few very clever minds figured out how to use it to implement even conditions and loops, for example - possibilities that even the inventor of the language had not anticipated. So, C++98 was in no way simple, but definitively much more simple than C++ today.