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Conformance to ISO Standards for C++

Time: 18:08 EST/23:08 GMT | News Source: Microsoft | Posted By: Jonathan Tigner

Microsoft® Visual C++® .NET 2003 achieves the highest level of standards-conformation of any release of Visual C++. Visual C++ was first launched in 1993, and the ISO C++ standard dates from 1997. Each release of Visual C++ since the standard has become more compliant, and this release achieves roughly 98% compliance. (No single industry accepted standardized test-suite exists to compare or measure C++ compiler implementations. Three popular suites are Dinkumware, Perennial, and Plum Hall. Visual C++ .NET 2003 was tested against all three).

This high level of compliance enables Visual C++ .NET 2003 to compile popular modern C++ libraries (including LOKI, BOOST, and BLITZ), a feat achieved by few, if any, other compilers.

A vital standard language feature for compiling these libraries is partial template specializtion, which is demonstrated by this sample. Try compiling it with other compilers; Visual C++ 2002, for example, gives error messages and cannot compile it.