The latest Motor Industry Software Reliability Association (MISRA) news has arrived in my mailbox and it notes that their draft C++ guidelines are now available for public comment.

These guidelines are for the use of the C++ language in critical systems. Their aim is to provide a set of rules that encourage good programming practices and avoid poorly-defined or insecure features of the language.

At a recent talk I went to it was noted that there were a couple of hundred features of C++ that fell into these categories so the guideline authors had their work cut out. However, the MISRA team did have a good starting point in earlier work at Lockheed Martin considering the same problem in the context of the Joint Strike Fighter development.

Production of the guidelines was motivated by an increasing interest in the industry in moving to C++ from C. (note to all you Java/Ruby folks out there - no I am not making this up.)

To participate in the review you need to download the form at http://www.misra.org.uk/misra_cpp_eoi.pdf sign it and return it to MISRA.