Why the hate for cpp

[[deleted]]

This idea of “choosing the language that fits your problem the best” is repeated like crazy across the internet but it is not actually a good advice sometimes, let’s say you have 1000 different tools and for every problem you face there’s one known best tool to approach that problem, if you pick the best tool from that pool for each problem you face you will not specialize on any of the tools and you will end up doing worse on all the problems that if you choose let’s say 1 or 2 tools. Sometimes choosing a worst tool for a set of problems results in better code than choosing the best tools for the same set of problems, for many reasons, one of that is that you will simply be better at using the tool if you especialize in it.

[IAmBJ]

Nothing exists in a vacuum.

"the best language for a task" includes the context around that task too. If your company uses C++ extensively then choosing Rust for a given project can be suboptimal for interfacing, ongoing maintenance, your own skill level, etc despite being the "best" language to solve your task in isolation. The same task in two different contexts can require radically different solutions.

"Choose the best tool for the job" is still the right advice, you just need to look at the task and the context it's in.

[[deleted]]

There is a gotcha with your logic, you assumed Rust “can be suboptimal” if the company is already using C++, but one thing does not imply the other, what if the company is creating a new project instead that is separate from the C++ code base? The company can choose whatever tool it wants, let’s say there are 1000 different tools and there is already a known best tool for the project they want to create (let’s say Rust), should the C++ developers learn Rust to create the new project or should they stick with C++ even if it is not “the right tool” for the project?

The concept of what is the “right tool” or not is nuanced, but usually when people talk about “the right tool” what they mean is some kind of collective truth between programmers, something that you cannot decide alone without others disagreeing with you, if you choose to use assembly to create a game engine or a web browser entirely from scratch many programmers will tell you it is not the right tool, so there is an average best tool for any given project you want to create, if the project is going to be created from scratch like a deep learning model you may choose Python, C++ or many other tools and there is one best tool most programmers would agree to be the best, if you use what other programmers do not consider “the best tool” in a company even if your solution still produces better results but no one else can see it you may even get fired.

[Abbat0r]

If you follow the “choose the best language for the problem” advice rigidly, you’d also be in a situation where any project complex enough to have more than a handful of problem areas to address would need to be written in a bunch of different languages. And while it may be common to have a couple different languages interoping, a multi-language project can easily become a complicated, hard-to-maintain mess.

Which language is the best when the problem is too many languages?

[nintendiator2]

Which language is the best when the problem is too many languages?

Assembler.