Effective C++: 55 Specific Ways to Improve Your Programs and Designs

Scott Meyersis one of the world's foremost authorities on C++, providing training and consulting services to clients worldwide. He is the author of the best-sellingEffective C++series of books (Effective C++,More Effective C++, andEffective STL) and of the innovativeEffective C++CD. He is consulting editor for Addison Wesley's Effective Software Development Series and is a founding member of the Advisory Board for The C++ more >>

Scott Meyersis one of the world's foremost authorities on C++, providing training and consulting services to clients worldwide. He is the author of the best-sellingEffective C++series of books (Effective C++,More Effective C++, andEffective STL) and of the innovativeEffective C++CD. He is consulting editor for Addison Wesley's Effective Software Development Series and is a founding member of the Advisory Board for The C++ Source (http://www.artima.com/cppsource). He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Brown University. His web site ishttp://www.aristeia.com.

“Every C++ professional needs a copy ofEffective C++. It is an absolute must-read for anyone thinking of doing serious C++ development. If you’ve never readEffective C++and you think you know everything about C++, think again.”
—Steve Schirripa,Software Engineer, Google

“C++ and the C++ community have grown up in the last fifteen years, and the third edition ofEffective C++reflects this. The clear and precise style of the book is evidence of Scott’s deep insight and distinctive ability to impart knowledge.”
—Gerhard Kreuzer,Research and Development Engineer, Siemens AG

The first two editions ofEffective C++were embraced by hundreds of thousands of programmers worldwide. The reason is clear: Scott Meyers’ practical approach to C++ describes the rules of thumb used by the experts — the things they almost always do or almost always avoid doing — to produce clear, correct, efficient code.

The book is organized around 55 specific guidelines, each of which describes a way to write better C++. Each is backed by concrete examples. For this third edition, more than half the content is new, including added chapters on managing resources and using templates. Topics from the second edition have been extensively revised to reflect modern design considerations, including exceptions, design patterns, and multithreading.

Important features ofEffective C++include:

• Expert guidance on the design of effective classes, functions, templates, and inheritance hierarchies.
• Applications of new “TR1” standard library functionality, along with comparisons to existing standard library components.
• Insights into differences between C++ and other languages (e.g., Java, C#, C) that help developers from those languages assimilate “the C++ way” of doing things.

I wrote the original edition ofEffective C++in 1991. When the time came for a second edition in 1997, I updated the material in important ways, but, because I didn’t want to confuse readers familiar with the first edition, I did my best to retain the existing structure: 48 of the original 50 Item titles remained essentially unchanged. If the book were a house, the second edition was the equivalent of freshening things up by replacing carpets, paint, and light fixtures.

For the third edition, I tore the place down to the studs. (There were times I wished I’d gone all the way to the foundation.) The world of C++ has undergone enormous change since 1991, and the goal of this book — to identify the most important C++ programming guidelines in a small, readable package — was no longer served by the Items I’d established nearly 15 years earlier. In 1991, it was reasonable to assume that C++ programmers came from a C background. Now, programmers moving to C++ are just as likely to come from Java or C#. In 1991, inheritance and objec << less