Re:GCC 11.1
by jcranmer on Tuesday April 27, 2021 @11:38AM
(#26957419)
Compiler writers are pretty quick to add support for new features--I'd say it's about a year-ish between being added to the standard (which is not the same as the actual release it's in!) and actually being usable in a compiler.
Where the delay comes into play is that most projects require a minimum support of a compiler that's several years out of date. And if you're required to support 4-year-old compilers, then C++17 features aren't going to be available, despite them being available in the newest versions of all compilers. Back in 2018, I was working on a project where I gave up and used C++17 features (constexpr if) because I knew I could get away with only supporting a Clang that's a few weeks old.
Where the delay comes into play is that most projects require a minimum support of a compiler that's several years out of date. And if you're required to support 4-year-old compilers, then C++17 features aren't going to be available, despite them being available in the newest versions of all compilers. Back in 2018, I was working on a project where I gave up and used C++17 features (constexpr if) because I knew I could get away with only supporting a Clang that's a few weeks old.