C++ (/ˌsiːˌplʌsˈplʌs/ "cee plus plus") is a general-purpose programming language. It has imperative, object-oriented and generic programming features, while also providing facilities for low-levelmemory manipulation.
It was designed with a bias toward system programming and embedded, resource-constrained and large systems, with performance, efficiency and flexibility of use as its design highlights. C++ has also been found useful in many other contexts, with key strengths being software infrastructure and resource-constrained applications, including desktop applications, servers (e.g. e-commerce, web search or SQL servers), and performance-critical applications (e.g. telephone switches or space probes). C++ is a compiled language, with implementations of it available on many platforms. Many vendors provide C++ compilers, including the Free Software Foundation, Microsoft, Intel, and IBM.
C++ is standardized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), with the latest standard version ratified and published by ISO in December 2017 as ISO/IEC 14882:2017(informally known as C++17) The C++ programming language was initially standardized in 1998 as ISO/IEC 14882:1998, which was then amended by the C++03, C++11 and C++14 standards. The current C++17 standard supersedes these with new features and an enlarged standard library. Before the initial standardization in 1998, C++ was developed by Bjarne Stroustrup at Bell Labssince 1979, as an extension of the C language as he wanted an efficient and flexible language similar to C, which also provided high-level features for program organization. C++20 is the next planned standard thereafter.
