Do C++ professionals know everything?

[lazarus102]

I'm wondering if game/program designers that work primarily with C++ know or should know everything in C++. Like do they memorize every possible line of code? Is it considered shameful for a person that works with C++ professionally to do how-to google searches now and then to refresh on how to do certain things?
Is it even possible for most people(excluding geniuses) to remember every possible line of code?

[Lachlan Easton]

should know everything in C++?

No. The answer to this question can almost get philosophical, the more a person learns the more they realise that they are ignorant of a topic.

do they memorize every possible line of code?

No of course not. Have you memorised every possible sentence of English?

do how-to google searches now and then

This is an important skill to have and never stops being useful. Being able to find solutions to your problems is the direct opposite of shameful.

Is it even possible

No, it is not possible.

Most programmers only ever use (or needs to use) a very small subset of a given language. That subset differs from from programmer to programmer.

[xenovia12]

i think youre asking that because you already see what c++ like or how long c++ is.
when i was asking the same question in myself i was like

damn maybe i should find another way but not in world of programming where i can became a programmer and make a website better than facebook or games better than dota 2 or become famous programmer

i think bjarne stroustrup knows only 80%? in c++ even he's the creator

[TwilightSpectre]

The thing about programming, is its just that, 'programming'. You need to split it in your mind from the syntax of the language - it just provides a frame for your program. Obviously, you need to learn the syntax to use that frame, and a better understanding of that language will allow you to use the frame better, but none of it will matter unless you can solve the problem at hand.

Of course, there is always room for searching the internet. After all, when 2 heads is better than 1, then why not add a few thousand heads worth of information from the internet? It will allow you to code better, and focus more on the problem than just reinventing the wheel each time.

As for game programmers in particular, most often nowadays, in larger companies at least, they will be split into various specializations. For example, you'd have a few amazing at low-level optimization, a few great with organizing the overall 'big picture' of the game, others writing graphics and UI, and then even things like physicists writing the physics engine and the like. Being a specialist is often as good, if not better, than a 'jack-of-all-trades'.

[lazarus102]

That's interesting and a bit of a relief. I had to ask this question last night when I got to this line of code that I found a bit difficult to commit to memory and realizing that there's much more complex lines of code than this.

srand(static_cast<unsigned int>(time(0)))

Hell all this does is make rand() actually random but apparently not even as random as it could/should be, the code that does is "out of the scope of this book" >,< . It's an intimidating language(I'll give it that). But I refuse to go easy mode(python) because I want to know a code that's more widely used and one that's used mostly for gaming.

[Ganado]

I find Python a quick way to test out some logic that I could later apply to a bigger C++ program, so that I can see if it even works or not with some simple tests before getting bogged by syntax. Also, I feel like Google/SO helps me out with Python a lot more at times than C++, though that might be because I never learned Python from a book.

Also this is what I usually use srand(time(NULL)); though I'm not making anything security-related or work for a casino, so it probably isn't the best solution for things like that, C++11 has stuff in <random> and <chrono> that probably are much better.