The price of lunch?

• “C++ is a wonderfully expressive language but it places stringent demands upon the developer's competence. In doing this it imposes a cost on any development using C++ which has to be balanced against the benefits offered by the capabilities of the language. Expressive power and skill are often linked - a violin is harder to play than a Stylophone but can, in the hands of a virtuoso, produce music that is in a different class. ...”

• “No such thing as a free lunch” Alan Griffiths, Overload 7

• “First of all, let me say that I think Alan makes an excellent point about the demands that C++ places on developers. .... It may not be so clear-cut that the benefits are correspondingly higher too and so I shall not attempt to argue that point...

• “At the end of the day, I basically agree with Alan - C++ is harder to use than C - and I think his comparison between a Stylophone and a violin is well-drawn. I don't blame the language (and I don't really think Alan does either) - I blame IT management for giving everyone a violin and saying "right, now play a tune!" What C++ highlights is the need for better training, better tools and more realistic expectations.”

• Sean Corfield (editor), ibid