Software "style" is about finding the perfect balance between overhead and functionality... elegance and maintainability... flexibility and excess. In "Exceptional C++ Style," legendary C++ guru Herb Sutter presents 40 new programming scenarios designed to analyze not only the what but the why and help you find just the right balance in your software. Organized around practical problems and solutions, this book offers new insight into crucial C++ details and interrelationships, and new strategies for today's key C++ programming techniques--including generic programming, STL, exception safety, and more. You'll find answers to questions like: What can you learn about library design from the STL itself?How do you avoid making templated code needlessly non-generic?Why shouldn't you specialize function templates? What should you do instead? How does exception safety go beyond try and catch statements?Should you use exception specifications, or not? When and how should you "leak" the private parts of a class?How do you make classes safer for versioning? What's the real memory cost of using standard containers?How can using const really optimize your code?How does writing inline affect performance? When does code that looks wrong actually compile and run perfectly, and why should you care?What's wrong with the design of std:: string? "Exceptional C++ Style" will help you design, architect, and code with style--and achieve greater robustness and performance in all your C++ software.

"Exceptional C++" shows by example how to go about sound software engineering in standard C++. Do you enjoy solving thorny C++ problems and puzzles? Do you relish writing robust and extensible code? Then take a few minutes and challenge yourself with some tough C++ design and programming problems.

The puzzles and problems in "Exceptional C++" not only entertain, they will help you hone your skills to become the sharpest C++ programmer you can be. Many of these problems are culled from the famous "Guru of the Week" feature of the Internet newsgroup comp.lang.c++.moderated, expanded and updated to conform to the official ISO/ANSI C++ Standard.

Each problem is rated according to difficulty and is designed to illustrate subtle programming mistakes or design considerations. After you've had a chance to attempt a solution yourself, the book then dissects the code, illustrates what went wrong, and shows how the problem can be fixed. Covering a broad range of C++ topics, the problems and solutions address critical issues such as:

• Generic programming and how to write reusable templates
• Exception safety issues and techniques
• Robust class design and inheritance
• Compiler firewalls and the Pimpl Idiom
• Name lookup, namespaces, and the Interface Principle
• Memory management issues and techniques
• Traps, pitfalls, and anti-idioms
• Optimization

Try your skills against the C++ masters and come away with the insight and experience to create more efficient, effective, robust, and portable C++ code.
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Consistent, high-quality coding standards improve software quality, reduce time-to-market, promote teamwork, eliminate time wasted on inconsequential matters, and simplify maintenance. Now, two of the world's most respected C++ experts distill the rich collective experience of the global C++ community into a set of coding standards that every developer and development team can understand and use as a basis for their own coding standards.

The authors cover virtually every facet of C++ programming: design and coding style, functions, operators, class design, inheritance, construction/destruction, copying, assignment, namespaces, modules, templates, genericity, exceptions, STL containers and algorithms, and more. Each standard is described concisely, with practical examples. From type definition to error handling, this book presents C++ best practices, including some that have only recently been identified and standardized-techniques you may not know even if you've used C++ for years. Along the way, you'll find answers to questions like What's worth standardizing--and what isn't? What are the best ways to code for scalability?What are the elements of a rational error handling policy? How (and why) do you avoid unnecessary initialization, cyclic, and definitional dependencies?When (and how) should you use static and dynamic polymorphism together?How do you practice "safe" overriding?When should you provide a no-fail swap? Why and how should you prevent exceptions from propagating across module boundaries?Why shouldn't you write namespace declarations or directives in a header file?Why should you use STL vector and string instead of arrays?How do you choose the right STL search or sortalgorithm?What rules should you follow to ensure type-safe code?

Whether you're working alone or with others, "C++ Coding Standards" will help you write cleaner code--and write it faster, with fewer hassles and less frustration.