Is there a C++ styled language without C trappings?

Question

The main reason to use C++ over a managed language these days is to gain the benefits C++ brings to the table. One of the pillars of C++ is "you don't pay for what you don't need". It can be argued though that sometimes you don't want to pay for backward compatibility with C. Many of the odd quirks of C++ can be attributed to this backward compatibility. What other languages are there where "you don't pay for what you don't need" including backward compatibility with C?

Edit/clarification: The real killer for me is in that second sentence. Is there a language truly designed from the ground up that doesn't impose things you don't want on your code? C++ has that as its design philosophy: don't want RTTI? It doesn't exist. Don't want garbage collection? It's not there. The problem with C++ is it (IMO) violates this requirement when it refuses to break from the past. I don't want the cruft of backward compatibility with 20 year old code hampering my going forward. C++ isn't willing to do that. What is/has?

Edit2: I suppose I should have been more clear about what a cost is. There are multiple potential costs. The one I was initially focusing on was runtime cost.

In C++ polymorphism through virtual methods has a cost. But not all methods pay that cost. A non-virtual C++ method is called with the same runtime cost as a plain old C function (having at least one parameter). C++ does not require you to use polymorphism. In other OOP languages all methods are virtual and so the cost of polymorphism cannot be avoided.

Runtime costs are most important but other costs mitigate against that. Assembly language would have the least runtime overhead obviously but the writing and maintenance costs of assembly language are a huge strike against it.

With that in mind the idea is to find languages that provide useful abstractions which, when not in use, do not affect runtime costs.

Answer 1

D language

D is a general purpose systems and applications programming language. It is a higher level language than C++, but retains the ability to write high performance code and interface directly with the operating system API's and with hardware. D is well suited to writing medium to large scale million line programs with teams of developers. D is easy to learn, provides many capabilities to aid the programmer, and is well suited to aggressive compiler optimization technology.

The general look of D is like C and C++. This makes it easier to learn and port code to D. Transitioning from C/C++ to D should feel natural. The programmer will not have to learn an entirely new way of doing things.

D drops C source code compatibility. Extensions to C that maintain source compatibility have already been done (C++ and ObjectiveC). Further work in this area is hampered by so much legacy code it is unlikely that significant improvements can be made.

Answer 2

You can also try Ch from : http://www.softintegration.com/

Answer 3

Try Aikido. Syntactically similar to C++, and I don't think it inherits C style backward compatibility.

Aikido @ Wikipedia

Answer 4

I'm tempted to downvote this question (but as of yet I have not). Your requirement that "you don't pay for what you don't use" depends very heavily on what exactly you use. You already mentioned in one of your comments that assembly is perhaps the most fluff-free language there is, but you complain about C, which sits somewhere between assembly and C++.

If you find garbage collection and explicit object-oriented features "fluff" then frankly, I think C is probably the best candidate. The language is actually small and elegantly designed. It meets most people's "fits in one's head" requirement. For a language that gives such close control over the hardware, it's very expressive.

If you are not tied to the hardware, then Scheme or some other minimalist dialect of Lisp probably fits the bill for "doesn't impose what you don't want on your code" but again, it all depends so heavily on what exactly it is that you don't want.

If there are some higher-level features you "can't live without" (which it seems you are implying by naming "C++ without C compatibility" as your language of choice) then you should say explicitly what those are. What exactly is C++ bringing to the table that you don't want to sacrifice?

Answer 5

SPECS is alternative syntactic binding for C++. This binding includes a simple syntax for declaring and defining types, functions, objects and templates, and changes several problematic operators and control structures. The resulting syntax is LALR(1) parsable.

Answer 6

Eiffel. Looks like Pascal, has C++ type semantics. Also, adds special "programming by contract" assertions that are built into the language definigion, years before people were talking about "X"Unit libraries.

Answer 7

Ada is another alternative - gc is optional in the implementation of the language:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_(programming_language)

Answer 8

I'm not exactly sure what costs backward compatibility with C has...

Answer 9

I'm not exactly sure there are any runtime hits associated with C backwards compatibility, could you elaborate? Certainly the backwards compatibility does give you more rope to hang yourself with but strict enforcement of rules can mitigate that. So I suppose my answer to you is C++ is the language that does what you ask for and you just need a tool to enforce valid constructs.

Edit: odd that i didn't notice the post directly below me with the same first line comment