Effective C++: 50 Specific Ways to Improve Your Programs and Design (2nd Edition) (Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series) (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This exceptionally useful text offers Scott Myers's expertise in C++ class design and programming tips. The second edition incorporates recent advances to C++ included in the ISO standard, including namespaces and built-in template classes, and is required reading for any working C++ developer.

The book opens with some hints for porting code from C to C++ and then moves on to the proper use of the new and delete operators in C++ for more robust memory management. The text then proceeds to class design, including the proper use of constructors, destructors, and overloaded operator functions for assignment within classes. (These guidelines ensure that you will create custom C++ classes that are fully functional data types, which can be copied and assigned just like built-in C++ classes.)

The author also provides a handful of suggestions for general class design, including strategies for using different types of inheritance and encapsulation. Never doctrinaire and always intelligent, these guidelines can make your C++ classes more robust and easier to maintain. --Richard Dragan

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Effective C++ CD is the HTML (Netscape-oriented) version of Scott Meyers' previous two works, Effective C++, Second Edition and More Effective C++. Additionally, five supplementary magazine articles appear in the collection. There are also links to relevant material on the Web which that been added to the current edition and which did not appear in the print edition.

Scott Meyers' work is so well known as scarcely to need introduction. Respect for his C++ acumen and pedagogic skills is so widespread that I was prepared to thoroughly detest his work, which I have encountered often but barely deigned to read to date.

On close examination, I find Meyers' books to be superb.

Of the 50 catechismic "Items" in the body of Effective C++, the vast majority are of critical importance to solid C++ programming. Virtually everything Scott Meyers suggests on these subjects is germane and practical. Where one could conceivably differ with Meyers' approach, his is nevertheless an entirely sound approach.

The second volume, More Effective C++, is cast in the same mold as the first volume. Here the discussion of 35 further "Items" tends to devolve somewhat towards matters of style. However, these are still critical issues being raised that the intermediate C++ programmer must confront sooner or later, athey are shipped too early. They fail because they arenthey are shipped too early. They fail because they arens presented in Meyers' rich and sympathetic tutorial prose. --Jack Woehr, Dr. Dobb's Journal -- Dr. Dobb's Journal

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 2 edition (September 2, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201924889
• ISBN-13: 978-0201924886
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (143 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #29,820 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

73 of 77 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't write C++ code without it..., March 3, 2000

By	Andrew Harbick (Harrisonburg, VA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

From beginning to end this book is packed with information that is IMMEDIATELY applicable. For example "Always declare destructors to be virtual" otherwise you may end leaking memory when subclasses are deleted. Or hiding the implementation of a class in an "Impl" that your class just passes through to. That way, if the implementation changes, the clients of the class are protected from recompilation.

Beyond the wealth of just downright practical information the oragization is fabulous. The only other technical book that has organization as good as this one is "Design Patterns" There are several chapters such as "Memory Management" that have "Items" and each item has a few paragraphs describing the motivation for why you should believe Meyers with examples to prove it. Then there are solid examples that show the implemantation of an example usage.

My company gave this book out with "Design Patterns" to EVERY developer in the company, and it was probably the smartest thing I've ever seen a company do.

Read it and learn a TON.

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Terrific coverage of fundamental C++ techniques, December 18, 1999

By	Robert D. C. Shearer (USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

An absolutely terrific book focusing on basic C++ and object-oriented programming techniques. A crucial book for anyone new to C++ to read.

While _Effective C++_ is an important and fundamental part of any C++ programmer's library, truly advanced C++ engineers are likely familiar with most or all of the techniques presented here (dynamic allocation, constructors, basic coding style, etc.). Scott Meyers' second book, _More Effective C++_, covers significantly more advanced techniques which the experienced programmer may not have encountered in everyday code and which may be more instructive. It is only in deference to that book that I have given this one 4 (or, if I could, 4.9) stars.

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Third Edition: Improving an already great book, May 27, 2005

By	ART SEDIGHI (Old Bethpage, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Effective C++: 55 Specific Ways to Improve Your Programs and Designs (3rd Edition) (Paperback)

How do you improve a book that has been known as a "bible" in the C++ community for years? As Scott mentions at the beginning of the text, he almost threw everything out, and started from scratch. When I first say the book, I thought that there are five new items that were added to the book, but I couldn't be more wrong. As you might have guessed, C++ has gone thru a number of significant changes over the past decade, and the third edition of this book is updated to take advantage of the new editions to the C++ standard. In reality, almost every item in this book has gone thru a re-write. Many have been consolidated and new chapters, topics and many new items have been added. A few items that did not make sense anymore like items 2, 3 and 4 in the second edition are removed from this third edition.

Scott breaks down the c++ language into 4 subparts:
* The old C subsystem. Before all these advanced programming languages such as Java and .NET came, C was the language of choice. C++ is "translated" to C first, and then complied and linked to an executable.
* OO C++, which is C with Classes. This is where the concept of Object Orientation in C++ started. Even though this concept was very much new a decade ago, it is very much part of a programmer's vocabulary.
* Template C++, which is the newest edition to the C++ standard and it brings with it the concept of Template Metaprogramming. This concept is very much new, and this book has dedicated a whole chapter around templates, and template metaprogramming.
* STL, which is the C++ Standard Template Library. Again, STL was a new concept a few years back, but it is very much an established notion in C++.

Scott has taken a new approach to this book and has covered all four of these subparts. He has a book dedicated to STL, but he is using STL notions and "language" throughout this book. The chances are that the reader is already familiar with other languages such as Java and .Net, so the text covers area where these two languages differ with C++, especially in the area of inheritance and polymorphism. But not everything has changed. Topics such as,"Explicitly disallow the use of Compiler Generated functions you do not want," will never get old or outdated.

New chapters cover topics such as C++ Template and Generic Programming, Resource Allocation and topics that cover the latest C++ standard and additions, including the TR1 (Technical Report 1). "new and delete" have been separated into their own chapter, and the author goes into great depth demonstrating to the reader the various ways that these two operators can be modified, and why.

Exceptions and programming in light of exceptions is also a very new concept in C++. The previous versions on this text did not touch on exceptions all that much, but the author has spread the use of exceptions throughout the text, with a number of items dedicated explicitly to exceptions and exceptions handling.

The updated items, new topics and chapters and a new look and feel of the text with color coded examples make this book a joy to for C++ programmer to read.