Comments by "xybersurfer" (@xybersurfer) on "Should you Learn C++ in 2019?" video.

@PlantSurgeon-growth i think a familiarization with low level stuff can be useful in some cases, but most of the time it isn't. it's those pointers in C++ that make it hard. C++ used to be my favorite until i got a taste of functional programming in a haskell-like language. higher-order functions (pass functions as values), immutability, strong typing to name a few make it good. it made me wonder why i put up with some C++ stuff. i would check it out if you haven't yet. it really changed the way i program in other languages. it's much more interesting than remembering arbitrary low level details. don't limit yourself
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@PlantSurgeon-growth if pointers are not hard, then why do i keep reading about security holes due to accessing out of range memory? have you not noticed how common this is?
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@PlantSurgeon-growth it takes more than simply getting a program to work, to protect it from memory access exploits. much of the C++ spec has undefined behavior. if you think that only inexperienced programmers make these mistakes then you lack experience. do you think that inexperienced programmers work on things that make it to the news?
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@PlantSurgeon-growth i did not say that a beginner can't have great visions. but, take for example the Heartbleed bug in OpenSSL. this mistake was made by someone with a PHD in computer science and the code was reviewed by his team, who also didn't pick up on it. this was also a Memory Access issue. people make mistakes sadly. me, you, everyone. i value languages that help prevent mistakes. even if you make no mistakes in C++ it's not really such a great language for directly expressing ideas in. look for example at the state of the C++ standard library and the crap they keep adding with every version of the language. that's why i've mostly moved on from C++. i programmed in C++ for several years so i do have some idea of what i'm talking about. i don't hate C++. there are plenty of worse languages like JavaScript and VB
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@hamu_sando the Heartbleed bug was caused in C code. C is almost completely a subset of C++. you mention Smart pointers, Higher-order functions and Immutable objects, but can you explain how they could have prevented Heartbleed? i think explicit casting is a big deal. once anybody has a pointer, they can cast it to anything they want
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