Embedded C++

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Major Japanese CPU manufacturers, including NEC, Hitachi, Fujitsu, and Toshiba, to address the shortcomings of C++ for embedded applications. The goal of the effort is to preserve the most useful object-oriented features of the C++ language yet minimize code size while maximizing execution efficiency and making compiler construction simpler.

Embedded C++ is a proper subset of C++, i.e. it has no additions. The following language features have been removed:

Multiple inheritance
Virtual base classes
Run-time type information (typeid)
New style casts (static_cast, dynamic_cast, reinterpret_cast and const_cast)
The mutable type qualifier
Namespaces
Exceptions
Templates

The language has not had a good reception with many expert C++ programmers. In particular, Bjarne Stroustrup says, "To the best of my knowledge EC++ is dead (2004), and if it isn't it ought to be."^[1]

A criticism is that EC++ is intended for use with 32-bit architecture instead of focusing on the big market of 8/16-bit microcontrollers.^[2]

In principle an EC++ program can be compiled with any C++ compiler; however, a specific EC++ compiler will be easier to build and might create code that is more efficient than the code from a C++ compiler. Metrowerks and Tasking Software provide compilers with specific EC++ support for embedded platforms.