Lyberta {l Wrote}:fluffrabbit {l Wrote}:C++ sits on top of operating system APIs, making more code, which real programmers don't need.
I'm extremely glad I don't have to call OS APIs most of the time. They are extremely horrible. All of them. I love that C++ safeguards me from OS. OS is bad. C++ good.
While that's probably true, I have always found the Windows API to be mysterious and magical. Windows C++ development is its own animal distinct from POSIX. The larger the C++ standard gets, the more Windows programmers shy away from MinGW and use MSVC instead, which I think is a shame. Back in the day, I was hesitant to use MinGW at all because it was bigger than 5 MB while the Tiny C Compiler was nice and compact (and libtcc for C scripting is a thing now too, yay). Now I just say screw Windows.
Lyberta {l Wrote}:fluffrabbit {l Wrote}:It would be nice to have C++ code that runs at a lower level than all that, such that a kernel and all the hardware drivers could be written in it. My gut tells me that running these proposed APIs on top of UEFI is a pipe dream
I think it's just a matter of someone porting stdlib to that environment. I'm definitely interested in writing some UEFI code.
Yes, that's the problem: getting the C++ runtime libraries on the target system. What about MS-DOS, Amiga, and the Sega Dreamcast? You can run C code on all of them, but I don't know about these proposed super-high-level APIs. On the other hand, if these super-high-level APIs become part of the C++ standard and run on top of or can even replace UEFI, you can replace operating systems! That would be awesome.