What is the difference between the standard library and the standard template library?

Question

Hello,

I keep seeing reference to both the C++ standard Library and the C++ Standard Template Library (STL). What is the difference between them? Wiki mentions that they share some headers but that's about it.

Thanks

Answer 1

The Standard Template Library (STL) is a library of containers, iterators, algorithms, and function objects, that was created by Alexander Stepanov; the SGI website has the canonical implementation and documentation.

The standard library is the library that is part of C++; it includes most of the Standard Template Library (STL).

In common usage, "STL" is also used to refer to the parts of the C++ standard library that come from or are derived from the actual SGI STL. For example, people often use "STL" to refer to std::vector and the rest of the containers in the C++ standard library, since they originated in the SGI STL.