STL, or MFC's Array/List?

[code_discuss]

I'm a Windows programmer and use MFC heavily. But in many forum/newsgroup STL seems to be a must have for a c++ programmer. So I'm curious that should I use STL or MFC's array/list in my project? STL seems to be a standard, but MFC's array/list fit in the MFC structure well.

[Christian Graus]

MFC containers are crap, they were a stopgap until they had STL in their compiler, and remained as a legacy support thing. They should never be used unless you have a compelling reason, you should use STL by default.

Christian Graus - Microsoft MVP - C++ "also I don't think "TranslateOneToTwoBillion OneHundredAndFortySevenMillion FourHundredAndEightyThreeThousand SixHundredAndFortySeven()" is a very good choice for a function name" - SpacixOne ( offering help to someone who really needed it ) ( spaces added for the benefit of people running at < 1280x1024 )

[Rajith]

Here are some performance readings which i took for CArray and std::vector Time taken to add 1 million elements( unsigned long ) CArray = 2.7360s ( 2736 ms ) //Will be faster if you set the size using SetSize() vector = 0.0210s ( 21 ms ) //Will be faster if you set the size using reserve() CList = 0.0260s ( 26 ms ) std::list = 0.1220 ( 122 ms ) CMap = 0.0820 ( 82 ms ) // Used InitHashTable( 200017 ) or else it will take ages to add elements stl::map = 0.0399 ( 399 ms ) Though STL is not as well structured or as easy to use as MFC but performance wise they win hands down. Note: Will using STL access the elements using iterators. It will be very fast.