[pjmlp]

What Java code?

Regardless of how they might have used LLMs, I tend to have an issue with this kind of complaint, given the C++ example code on the Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software book, released in 1994, 2 years before Java was made public.

Or the examples from "Using the Booch Method: A Rational Approach", "Designing Object Oriented C++ Applications Using The Booch Method", or "Using the Booch Method: A Rational Approach".

Additional there are enough framework examples starting with Turbo Vision in 1990, MacAPP in 1989, OWL in 1991, MFC in 1992,....

Somehow a C++ style that was prevalent in the industry between 1990 and 1996, that I bet plenty of devs still have to maintain in 2026, has become "Java in C++".

[bregma]

> What Java code?

A class with a passel of static member functions is Java code. It is not in any way idiomatic C++ code which has had namespace-level ("free") functions since it was invented as C-with-classes many decades ago. Using classes holding a whole lot of static member functions is strongly frowned on in the professional C++ community.

[dwrodri]

Author here:

A lot of my professional C++ experience comes from the computer vision space where I am specifically linking against FFmpeg (libav does its own share of memory management tricks that don't always play well with RAII).

I think of static functions (even within member classes) as a signifier of "hey, you don't need a constructed object for this to work and it doesn't depend on class instance state".

In application code, I was typically relying on Myers Singletons and the implicit thread-safeness more than what you see here. I debated dropping the static keyword because it stands out as odd especially in a private class method, but settled on keeping it.

[pjmlp]

Certainly not the professional C++ comunity that still uses frameworks born in the 1990's predating Java, or game engines.

[antonvs]

> Somehow

There's not much mystery about that - Java took that approach and ran with it, and now has much greater mindshare than C++.

Also, the mid-90s were before most software developers working today were born, I suspect. They'd have to go find a graybeard and ask them to tell them tales of yore, to find out about any of this.

[pjmlp]

We gladly tell bonefire tales. :)