which standard of c++ (c++0x, c++3, c++11) is the most portable (across other compilers)?
i read that visual c++ doesn't fully support c++11, but gcc does.
in C i only used c89 for portability, which should i use in c++, or does it not matter?
I like to use visual c++ on windows, and codeblocks (gcc) on linux. I like to have my code portable between both OSes & compilers
C++0x and C++11 refer to the same edition of the standard. The "0x" was just short hand for "we think it is going to be published in '08 or '09, but we don't know yet... oh, it was published in '0B!".
Anyway, if you need your code to be compilable on compilers (and standard library implementations) that fall well short of implementing C++11, then just write your code with respect to C++03.
Look up a C++ Reference and learn How To Ask Questions The Smart WayOriginally Posted by Bjarne Stroustrup (2000-10-14)
O_o
I'd go with C++03 as well. (Well, C++98 as C++03 is basically just a "bug fix".)
If you have at least "GCC 4.0" or "Microsoft Visual C++ 2003" and higher you'll have a very large C++03 surface area to hit. There is really very few corners cases where you'd need hacks to provide that portability.
You can proof forward to some of the C++11 features by using the "Boost" library if you need some of those library features.
[Edit]
The "Boost" library is extremely portable in that the implements have targeted an enormous number of bugs with hundreds of fixes.
[/Edit]
Soma
I don't know of any current commercial compiler that doesn't support C99 and C++03. Where I work, we won't be adopting C++11/14 for a few years since some of our platforms' compiler vendors won't support it for a while. C++03 is a sure bet in my experience, though. Also, I've never had trouble getting access to C99 features either (the fixed-size integer types interest me, mostly).
"If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything"
-Mark Twain
I know of one, Microsoft C is not C99 compatible, and probably never will be.I don't know of any current commercial compiler that doesn't support C99
Their C++ compiler does support most of C++11 and they seem to be moving towards complete compliance of this standard.
Jim
Ah, true. I've been spoiled writing for Unix-like environments.
"If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything"
-Mark Twain
O_oTheir C++ compiler does support most of C++11 and they seem to be moving towards complete compliance of this standard.
Well, things may have changed, and I certainly hope that is the case, but last I checked, Microsoft was still more or less sticking to "We have no intention of ever supporting some C++11 features.", but they also said the same thing about variadic templates which has been available for a few months.
Soma
Far from it. They have an essentially complete standard library without constexpr and initializer list support, but the number of core language features missing is staggering, and they seem unwilling to pump any more any time soon, as indicated by their silence. They did promise incremental updates to the compiler, but we have yet to see that.
We'll see how things turn out in VC12.
Of course, mingw and clang are both available on Windows, and they have pretty much full C++11 support and are moving towards starting implementation of C++14.
Clang? Available on Windows!?!
That's still in the rather experimental stage. As far as I can see, you either have to go to a lot of trouble to download and install various tools and build the compiler yourself!, or you have to have something that unzips .gz files, and other messing around whilst having very limited options in terms of any support. And of course there's no x64 support yet.
It's hardly a realistic option for the typical programmer at this point.
As for mingw, unless you are adept at makefiles (I wouldn't waste my time with such primitive stuff), you pretty much need to install codeblocks, which came with a rather outdated version of mingw last time I checked.
My homepage
Advice: Take only as directed - If symptoms persist, please see your debugger
Linus Torvalds: "But it clearly is the only right way. The fact that everybody else does it some other way only means that they are wrong"
CMake has support for MinGW. And besides Codeblocks, there is also Netbeans/Eclipse.
Depends on your needs, really.
But sure, there are prebuilt binaries for clang for windows, and it's not tricky to get it working at all (if you do it right; I can imagine it being tough for a newbie who has no idea where to look).
And again, correct me if I'm wrong, but you can just manually install mingw and set up codeblocks to use it. Not ideal for a newbie, but it works.
I read a thread on, hmm stackoverflow I think it was, not so long ago, where someone had done exactly that, and the consensus about the problems they were having was due to an incompatibility between the mingw version and codeblocks.
My homepage
Advice: Take only as directed - If symptoms persist, please see your debugger
Linus Torvalds: "But it clearly is the only right way. The fact that everybody else does it some other way only means that they are wrong"
O_oI read a thread on, hmm stackoverflow I think it was, not so long ago, where someone had done exactly that, and the consensus about the problems they were having was due to an incompatibility between the mingw version and codeblocks.
Well, the people saying that didn't know what they were talking about.
Yes, different distributions of "MinGW" may have different directories to include or the individual distributing the binary may have failed to get the relative positioning installed correctly, but the primary options which the "CodeBlocks" "GCC" plugin would use haven't changed in a long time.
Problems such as those aren't related to an incompatibility between "CodeBlocks" and "MinGW"; such problems are born of the individuals distributing binaries not doing the job properly.
These directories all point to "CC1.exe" without which compiling just does not happen:
Code:libexec\gcc\mingw32\4.6.1Code:libexec\gcc\i686-pc-mingw32\4.7.1Code:libexec\gcc\4.8.0None of these distributions have properly enabled relative positioning so if these directories aren't part of the "Path" environment variable compilation fails.Code:libexec\gcc\i686-pc-mingw32\4.8.1
You have to add such paths to "CodeBlocks" manually, and that's just one issue; several other required files like "crtbegin.o", "libgcc.a", and "sup/bits/*" also live in different directories for these distributions.
The setup can be a mess if you aren't used to it, but it is just a matter of finding where all the right bits are and telling "CodeBlocks".
Soma
If you don't need 64bit then this is one of the best MinGW distros I've used.
MinGW Distro - nuwen.net
James
