The reason you think this guy is using std::list incorrectly is because you're not thinking about his requirements. Instead of spending a few seconds to understand why he would keep a std::list<foo* >, you immediately ran back to HN to make a comment about it.
He's a game programmer. He's keeping pointers to instances because these entities are part of an inheritance hierarchy[0]. That level of indirection is essential to his problem and completely unavoidable. On the other hand, std::list<std::unique_ptr<foo>> wouldn't change anything at all about the particularly inefficient memory arrangement of std::list<foo* >; std::unique_ptr is, after all, just a class with one pointer member.
When smart people write things you think are obviously dumb, you should invest some additional time trying to understand the context of their statements before writing them off. You'll learn more, and you won't come off as a flippant junior developer.
> The reason you think this guy is using std::list incorrectly is because you're not thinking about his requirements.
The reasoning and requirements for him using intrusive lists was quite clear to me. The remaining article that starts at "Using intrusive lists" I found quite interesting and insightful.
My entire argument is against his evidence backing up statements like, "If you’re a programmer who uses the C++ STL std::list, you’re doing it wrong." It's unfair to improperly use std::list, compare it to a better solution, and then make a sweeping generalization. That's just outrageous.
It's clear from the subtitle of the blog ("Game design, game programming, deployment automation and more"), the title of the specific blog post, ("Avoiding game crashes related to linked lists"), and the very next paragraph of your quotation ("Based on watching the successes and failures of programmers writing games like Starcraft and Guild Wars...") that the author is talking about a very specific technique applied to a very specific sort of programming, and yet you're still complaining that he is making "a sweeping generalization"?
Stop wasting your time and ours arguing about an interpretation of his words the author never intended. Such literalistic argument-making serves only to mislead and misdirect, and it contributes nothing to the conversation.
> "Is "std::list considered harmful" in the general field of C++ or are
you only talking about the very specific game programming field you
used it for?"
> "I think it's harmful for all programming, but if you read the comments you'll find almost as many different opinions on the subject as comments!
The problem is that manually managing lists is error-prone, which is why I use a solution that automatically handles them; I think all programs, not just games, would benefit from their use."
He's a game programmer. He's keeping pointers to instances because these entities are part of an inheritance hierarchy[0]. That level of indirection is essential to his problem and completely unavoidable. On the other hand, std::list<std::unique_ptr<foo>> wouldn't change anything at all about the particularly inefficient memory arrangement of std::list<foo* >; std::unique_ptr is, after all, just a class with one pointer member.
When smart people write things you think are obviously dumb, you should invest some additional time trying to understand the context of their statements before writing them off. You'll learn more, and you won't come off as a flippant junior developer.
[0] http://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/tough-times-on-the-road-to-s...