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Oral History of Bjarne Stroustrup

Computer History MuseumCited 4× on HN, 2015–2023
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interview · intermediate · evergreen · 2015–2023 on HN

A two-hour Computer History Museum oral history interview with Bjarne Stroustrup, conducted by Paul McJones in 2015. It covers his youth, education at Aarhus and Cambridge, his career at Bell Labs and elsewhere, and the design and evolution of C++.

HN commenters cite it as a primary source for why Stroustrup created C++, including combining C and Simula and the aim of zero-cost abstractions.

C, C++, Rust, Go & systems languagesTech pioneers & interviewsHistory of computing#bjarnestroustrup#c++#simula#belllabs

4 comments from Hacker News

@FrankyHollywood2023-07 · in “Simula the Forgotten Programming Language”

Stroustrup once told about how he needed the best of both C and Simula, which resulted in creating C++. Full interview: ▶ this video

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@labrador2022-10 · in “Why Rust?”

In "Oral History of Bjarne Stroustrup" Bjarne describes his goal for C++, which was abstractions with zero runtime cost : ▶ this video I understand Rust is fast, but how does it do with complex abstractions?

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@pjmlp2017-03 · in “Rust's language ergonomics initiative”

It is, after being forced to use BCPL to finish his PhD and being used to languages like Simula, Bjarne swore he wouldn't be doing that again. Hence why he started to design C with Classes after getting his job at AT&T. ▶ this video Around 29:00.

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@pjmlp2015-10 · in “Is Java more secure than C?”

Yeah, I should have let the "just" out. There are a whole class of errors caused by C's memory corruption "feature" that I can happily live without. C tosses safety away, because its designers were lazy to implement a proper compiler given what the computing world was doing outside AT&T. Bjarne wasn't also quite found of it, but he had to compromise to get adoption, given his employer. ▶ this video

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