Re: Clear doubts regarding the C++ Runtime

Chris Torek wrote:
> Tim Prince <tprince@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> ritesh wrote:
>
>>> I have been reading some text on C and C++ (i.e advanced books).
>>> One of the books mentioned that C++ requires a runtime support
>>> whereas C does not ...
>
>> If you mean that it is usual to link shared libraries (such as
>> .so or .dll), that is true of both C and C++, but C++ requires
>> more of them. ...
>
> I suspect the real question was more about RTTI and/or exception
> handling, both of which complicate C++ enormously (compared to C).
> Of course, comp.lang.c is the wrong newsgroup on which to discuss
> either one.
>
>> ... Static linking will inflate the size of a C++ build much
>> more than a C build. Reasons for the differences are surely not
>> topical on c.l.c.
>
> Indeed.
>
> (In theory, of course, a C++ program that avoids using the RTTI
> and exception features -- and much of the rest of C++ along with
> them, since, e.g., "new" now throws exceptions -- could compile to
> similary-small static-linked binaries. Of course, if one is going
> to avoid all these C++ features, I would wonder why that one is
> writing C++ code at all. If one simply wants, e.g., the convenience
> of variable declaration at point of first use, C99 supports that
> already; and quite a few C compilers, while not yet "full C99",
> include this now as well.)

I think the primary conclusion is that the original "advanced" book
author is woefully misinformed. In fact I would characterize him
as "having his head up where the sun don't shine".

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