1.1) Origins Of C++
Timeline
- 1972 - C created by Dennis Ritchie, to support development of UNIX
- 1978 - Publication of the 'K&R book' (first book describing the C language)
- 1979 - Bjarne Stroustrup at Bell Labs created 'C with Classes' (later renamed C++)
- 1983 - First version of C++ used internally at AT&T
- 1985 - First commercial C++ development tools
- 1998 - ISO standardization of the language
Comparison with C
- C++ retains almost all of C as a subset but is significantly bigger and more complex
- C++ has better type checking than C
- C++ supports a wider range of programming styles
- Object-oriented programming (covered briefly in this course)
- Generic programming (not covered here)
- Both languages are very widely used in industry, particularly in situations where high performance is required or where programming must be done at a low level (e.g. to control hardware)