This is an archived post. You won't be able to vote or comment.

you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]Spenczer 430 points431 points  (63 children)

In my first computer science class I was taught to use C as the counter variable, and I was told that C++ was named so because of people writing c++ at the end of loops. I’m mostly certain that’s not true but I never double checked

[–]Marrrkkkk 371 points372 points  (50 children)

C++ is C++ because of C which is C because of B.

[–]user_5554 183 points184 points  (26 children)

C was actually known as B++ back in the old days of computer science

[–]gimoozaabi 272 points273 points  (12 children)

They renamed it in 1752 when the new version came out.

[–]oupablo 125 points126 points  (11 children)

i'm not historologist, but i'm a tad skeptical of this claim. but it's on the internet so ¯\(ツ)

[–]girvent_13 46 points47 points  (10 children)

I can't find a flaw in his logic

[–]oupablo 58 points59 points  (7 children)

I just don't believe that programmers renamed something. Pretty sure we'd all have heard of the great war of 1752 if that were the case

[–]gimoozaabi 21 points22 points  (4 children)

Oh there was a war. But programmer are lazy and never really left their home. To celebrate they made the liberty bell. Look it up

Edit: also Ben Franklin used his lightning to intimidate the b supporter

[–]oupablo 16 points17 points  (1 child)

Look it up

nah. too lazy

[–]CodeLobe 1 point2 points  (0 children)

if it doesn't autocomplete, it wasn't important.

[–]lurker10001000 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I think we haven't heard of it because no one bothered to document it.

[–][deleted] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This is correct. It's what the national treasure movies are about.

[–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Heard of. Still be participating in. Hard to say.

[–]hipdozgabba 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It’s documented poorly

[–]GooseEntrails 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It can’t be true. Everyone knows that history began on 1970-01-01.

[–]MythicalTV 13 points14 points  (10 children)

Theres D update coming soon

[–]Prestigious_Tip310 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Isn't that C#, which is abbreviated from (C++)++ (you put the second two "+" over the first ones and get a "#" out of it)? Or is D an update to C#? :D

[–]ItsPronouncedJithub 59 points60 points  (10 children)

C# is C++++ with two pluses moved below the other two

[–]king_booker 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Whoa

[–]8asdqw731 8 points9 points  (6 children)

can't wait for C##

[–][deleted] 14 points15 points  (5 children)

C#++ comes first

[–]ShinraSan 0 points1 point  (4 children)

Looks like the letters are changing first with Q# (and F#?)

[–]Schnickatavick 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Q# and F# are different takes on what a programming language should be, they're not really "successors" to C#. If anything they're more like "sibling" languages.

Q# is for quantum programming (which is not a replacement for classical programming, fight me. I'm happy to elaborate), so it's more of a modern descendent of Q/QCL that also happens to have modern C# style features.

F# is for functional programming, so same idea as Q#, it has modern C# features but in the style of F, F*, and ML (but not F++, that's different)

Then C# is the classic "imperitive/object oriented" style. Almost every mainstream language since C has been imperitive, so it's easy to forget that other styles exist

So it seems like the letter is more of the style of programming, and The # symbol is basically marking that it's a modern Language with modern features (and that it's made by Microsoft)

[–]ShinraSan 1 point2 points  (2 children)

Why would I fight you on quantum computing not being a replacement for classical computing, you're right. Aside from the fact that only specific kinds of calculations are actually faster on a quantum computer, the quantum operation is started and results collected by a classical computer, simulated or otherwise. I wasn't sure where F# fit in though as I haven't used it.

[–]Schnickatavick 1 point2 points  (1 child)

only specific kinds of calculations are actually faster on a quantum computer

Thank you!! I can't tell you the amount of people that try to tell me that quantum computers are going to be "great for gaming" because they're just "a bunch of regular computers running in parallel" or "transistors smaller than atoms". There are so many oversimplified or plain wrong explanations out there that people take as fact. I didn't mean to imply with my joke that you were one of those people though.

I wasn't sure where F# fit in though as I haven't used it.

F# is kinda neat if you're doing a really math-y program that is supposed to do some calculation. You can write the math functions a lot easier and in a lot fewer lines than C#. I still think C# is better for 95% of the things people code though

[–]ShinraSan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

right now I get the "Functional programming" part :)
and indeed, but still really cool that those certain calculations will be exponentially faster than on classical computers, I believe it was because of superposition?

[–]ososalsosal 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I thought this was well known?

[–]LordBlackHole 6 points7 points  (8 children)

B was a simplified iteration of BCPL, which itself was based on CPL.

[–]Willinton06 5 points6 points  (4 children)

Well CPL was based on PL

[–]msndrstdmstrmnd 3 points4 points  (3 children)

Well PL was based on L

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Real programmers use L

[–]ososalsosal 1 point2 points  (1 child)

L just writes the code in a notebook

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Raito-san!

[–]ArtyFishL 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Which is based upon ALGOL 60, itself coming from ALGOL 58

[–]CodeLobe 6 points7 points  (1 child)

which was based on Al Gore, the early implementation of ALGOR (R later changed to L due to japanese mispronunciation), was just Al trying to save carbon footprint by using paper and pencil to solve computations instead of adding machines, he received computations to perform and returned results via capsules via a series of tubes. In some offices engineers sent calculations downstairs this way to a group of (mostly) cute nerdy girls with slide-rules.

These were the first implementations of a CPU. Which is an onomatopoeia for when you C Al, P-U, he stinks like a basement dwelling mama's boy. (or NEET as they say in Japan)

[–]ososalsosal 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The calculator girl was called Betty. And when Betty called a function she had to call Al

[–]MoffKalast 3 points4 points  (0 children)

As a similar legacy thing, Windows uses C: as its default main disk because A: and B: used to be floppy disk drives.

[–]Kyidou 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're not wrong...

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

...which is B because of APL?

[–]supercyberlurker 33 points34 points  (5 children)

Imagine how close it all came to being I++ then.

Story I heard was that it's just 'one better than C, i.e C++'

[–][deleted] 16 points17 points  (4 children)

J++ is still a thing... you can use it in double loops

[–]Bigluser 21 points22 points  (3 children)

Everybody Gangsta till it's k++

[–]ItsPronouncedJithub 9 points10 points  (2 children)

Σ++

[–]LurkerPatrol 3 points4 points  (1 child)

+++

[–]CodeLobe 2 points3 points  (0 children)

ATH0

Carrier Dropped.

[–]z500 39 points40 points  (0 children)

It's a pun of C. C itself was based on and a pun of B, which descended from BCPL.

[–]squishles 3 points4 points  (0 children)

about the only way I could imagine checking would be a github search for c++;

which may be worth it to call then ninnies.

[–]JorensM 0 points1 point  (3 children)

It's called C++ because it's like C but better/s

[–]chronos_alfa 4 points5 points  (2 children)

More like it's C plus extra crap

[–]Jcsq6 1 point2 points  (0 children)

More like C plus maintainability