NetNews Offline 2/NetNews Offline Volume 2.iso/news/comp/lang/c++-part1/6208

Text File | 1996-08-05 | 1.8 KB | 38 lines

Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Path: undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca!sckettle
From: [e-mail] (Steve Kettle)
Subject: Does OOP, C++ really pay off?
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Date: Sat, 10 Feb 1996 20:10:08 GMT
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Organization: University of Waterloo

   Most people agree that OOP is a neat thing.  C++ is an efficient
implementation of an OOP programming language.  Now what I want to know
is does the use of C++ along with advanced OOP techniques really payoff
in  the development of large applications ?  Can majors features and major
changes be added to the app quickly and efficiently ?  Is the app more
understandable for a new programmer joining the team ?

   From an intuitive standpoint and from theory and just plain logic, to
ME anyways, C++ with OOP emphasis pays off more so than C.  However I see
no data from any sources to support this claim.  Where are the scientific
controlled experiments ?  Does OOP reduce bugs ?  I think it does but
people could come up with some pretty strong arguments about how it
increases bugs in subtle ways.  How many times has a programmer changed a
member function signature without updating the signature of the member
function in the derived classes to agree ?  Want a bug - that's one hell
of a logic bug.  ( with gnu g++ you can turn on a flag for warnings about
this though ).  All I'm saying is there are arguments for and against OOP,
C++.

   We can argue all day on a theory level but scientific studies carried
out in an unbiased way must be performed if we really are to know the
true savings or true losses.  Anybody out there working on these studies ?
We have all got to grow up and get practical. CS isn't math it is a science.

Steve.

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