I hear this a lot, but I don’t really understand how this manifests in language complexity like the stuff in TFA in practice.

Like, I can understand how systems programming requiring programmers to think about questions like “how can I proceed if allocation fails? How does this code work in an embedded context with no heap?” is hard and irreducible.

But I can’t understand why a language’s choice to impose complex rules like C++ move constructor hell is an inevitable outcome of irreducible complexity in systems programming. Put another way: C is also a systems programming language that works for many people, and it doesn’t have any of these Byzantine rules (unless you build them yourself). That’s not to say C is better/preferable, but it swims in the same “official Big Gun systems language” pond as C++, which seems to indicate that revalue semantics as complex as C++’s are a choice, not an inevitability.

I have no problem with systems programming issues. That complexity is essential complexity inherent in the problem itself, regardless of language. I have a problem with C++’s accidental complexity. I find C much more tractable. It certainly has a few of its own footguns, but it has much less accidental complexity.

What does in the large mean?