As for external libraries...sometimes it requires a bit of ingenuity to find that perfect 'wrap everything!' vs 'write C' balance... but it's usually not so bad if you approach the problem judiciously. unique_ptr and shared_ptr's capabilities are often underestimated in this regard for instance. Both can be used with external reference counting, the former being the most efficient.
https://gist.github.com/nlyan/7319c7b2a6328460ce9c
As for external libraries...sometimes it requires a bit of ingenuity to find that perfect 'wrap everything!' vs 'write C' balance... but it's usually not so bad if you approach the problem judiciously. unique_ptr and shared_ptr's capabilities are often underestimated in this regard for instance. Both can be used with external reference counting, the former being the most efficient.