Frequently asked questions about the Standard C++ library

This article provides a list of frequently asked questions (FAQs) about the Standard C++ libraries and the answers to those questions.

Original product version:   Visual C++
Original KB number:   154419

What does Standard C++ library contain

The Standard C++ library provides an extensible framework and contains components for language support, diagnostics, general utilities, strings, locales, standard template library (containers, iterators, algorithms, and numerics), and input/output.

The Standard C++ library can be divided into the following categories:

  1. Standard Template Library (STL) components provide a C++ program with access to a subset of the most widely used algorithms and data structures. STL headers can be grouped into three major organizing concepts:

    • Containers: template classes that support common ways to organize data, such as vector, list, deque, stack, queue, set, and map.

    • Algorithms: template functions for performing common operations on sequences of objects, such as functional, algorithm, and numeric.

    • Iterators: the glue that pastes algorithms and containers together, such as utility, iterator, and memory.

  2. Input/Output includes components for forward declarations of iostreams (iosfwd), predefined iostreams objects (iostream), base iostreams classes (ios), stream buffering (streambuf), stream formatting and manipulators (iosmanip, istream, ostream), string streams (sstream), and file streams (fstream).

  3. Other Standard C++ headers include:

    • Language Support: components for common type definitions used throughout the library (cstddef), characteristics of the predefined types (limits, cfloat, climits), functions supporting start and termination of a C++ program (cstdlib), support for dynamic memory management (new), support for dynamic type identification (typeinfo), support for exception processing (exception), and other runtime support (cstdarg, ctime, csetlmp, csignal).

    • Diagnostics: components for reporting several kinds of exceptional conditions (stdexcept), documenting program assertions (cassert), and a global variable for error number codes (cerrno).

    • Strings: components for string classes (string) and null-terminated sequence utilities (cctype, cwctype, cwchar).

    • Localization: components that C++ programs may use to encapsulate cultural differences. The locale facility includes internationalization support for character classification and string collation, numeric, monetary, and date/time formatting and parsing, and message retrieval (locale, clocale).

What is difference between CRT and Standard C++ library? What libraries will Runtime library compiler options include

Visual C++ include the following libraries besides the Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) libraries:

  • Basic C-Runtime library
  • Standard C++ library
Library types and related compiler switches Basic C Runtime library / Standard C++ library
Single-threaded (/ML) LIBC.LIB / LIBCP.LIB
Debug Single-threaded (/MLd) LIBCD.LIB / LIBCPD.LIB
Multithreaded (/MT) LIBCMT.LIB / LIBCPMT.LIB
Debug Multithreaded (/MTd) LIBCMTD.LIB / LIBCPMTD.LIB
Multithreaded DLL (/MD) MSVCRT.LIB / MSVCPRT.LIB
Debug Multithreaded /DLL (MDd) MSVCRTD.LIB / MSVCPRTD.LIB

Note

  • The /ML and /MLd library compiler options for statically single-threaded libraries have been removed in Visual C++.
  • MSVCPRT.lib and MSVCPRTD.lib are static libraries and don't have any dynamic link libraries (DLLs) directly related to them. These libraries are also dependent on MSVCRT.lib and MSVCRTD.lib, respectively. If you have any applications that use MSVCPRT.lib or MSVCPRTD.lib and you use the Ignore Default Library (/NOD or NODEFAULTLIB) option, be sure to link MSVCPRT.lib (or MSVCPRTD.lib) and MSVCRT.lib (or MSVCRTD.lib) with your application. Otherwise, you will get linker errors (LNK2001: unresolved externals in MSVCPRT.lib or MSVCPRTD.lib) when linking your application. Depending on the headers you use in your code, a library from the Standard C++ library may also be linked.

The header file use_ansi.h contains #pragma statements that force the Standard C++ library to be linked in. All Standard C++ headers include use_ansi.h: if you include any Standard C++ header in your application, the Standard C++ library will be linked by default.

Standard C++ headers

Column 1 Column 2 Column 3 Column 4
ALGORITHM BITSET COMPLEX DEQUE
EXCEPTION FSTREAM FUNCTIONAL IOMANIP
IOS IOSFWD IOSTREAM ISTREAM
ITERATOR LIMITS LIST LOCALE
MAP MEMORY NUMERIC OSTREAM
QUEUE SET SSTREAM STACK
STDEXCEPT STREAMBUF STRING STRSTREAM
TYPEINFO UTILITY VALARRAY VECTOR

How to retain old `iostream` functionality from Visual C++ .NET 2003 or earlier versions if I port my project from an earlier version

If you want to retain the old iostream library (iostream.h), include one or more of the old iostream header files in your code. Don't use the new Standard C++ headers. You can't mix calls to the old iostream library and the new Standard C++ library.

How to make Standard C++ Libraries the default libraries for my application

If you want to make the Standard C++ Libraries the default, include one or more of the new Standard C++ headers. You can't mix calls to the old iostream and the new Standard C++ library. Existing libraries (static or dynamic link) that use old iostream functions will have to be modified to use Standard C++ library iostream functions.

If I use Standard C++ Libraries in MFC applications, will it cause conflicts with C-Runtime Libraries

No. Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) doesn't use any C-Runtime functions that will conflict with the Standard C++ Libraries.

Why I get error (error C2065: '`cout`' : undeclared identifier) even though I have included `iostream`

Standard C++ library is implemented in its own namespace std. Make sure to add the following statement in the beginning of your program:

using namespace std;

Or qualify each Standard C++ library identifier with namespace std, for example, std::cout.

Why I get error (compiler error C2371: 'identifier' redefinition; different basic types)

In versions of Visual C++ that are earlier than Visual C++ 2005, mixing Standard C++ headers and old iostream headers causes this error, even if they're included in different source files. The following are the different headers:

  • Old iostream headers:

    Column 1 Column 2
    FSTREAM.H IOMANIP.H
    IOS.H IOSTREAM.H
    ISTREAM.H OSTREAM.H
    STDIOSTR.H STREAMB.H
    STRSTREA.H
  • Standard C++ headers:

    Column 1 Column 2 Column 3 Column 4
    ALGORITHM BITSET COMPLEX DEQUE
    EXCEPTION FSTREAM FUNCTIONAL IOMANIP
    IOS IOSFWD IOSTREAM ISTREAM
    ITERATOR LIMITS LIST LOCALE
    MAP MEMORY NUMERIC OSTREAM
    QUEUE SET SSTREAM STACK
    STDEXCEPT STREAMBUF STRING STRSTREAM
    TYPEINFO UTILITY VALARRAY VECTOR

Why I get message (LNK2001: unresolved external symbol 'symbol';) on `iostream` function calls when the project is built with Ignore Default Libraries

The iostream functions have been removed from the C-Runtime library.

If you're using the old iostream functions, you must add another library LIBCI.lib (single-threaded ML), LIBCIMT.lib (multithreaded MT), or MSVCIRT.lib (multithreaded dll MD). These libraries have been removed from Visual C++.

If you're using the new iostream functions included with the Standard C++ library, you must add another library LIBCP.lib (single-threaded ML), LIBCPMT.lib (multithreaded MT), or MSVCPRT.lib (multithreaded dll MD).

Don't mix different versions of the libraries. For example, if you're using the single-threaded version of the C-Runtime library, you must also use the single-threaded version of the old iostream library or Standard C++ library.

You can't mix calls to the old iostream library functions and the new Standard C++ library iostream functions.

Why do I get compiler warnings C4786 or C4788? None of the symbols in my program is anywhere near 255 characters in length

C4786 or C4788 is issued when a symbol's name exceeds 255 characters in length. This issue often happens with template class, and STL uses template class extensively.

Ignoring this warning is safe. Use a #pragma warning (disable: 4786,4788) to suppress the messages.

Why I get message (C4530: C++ exception handler used, but unwind semantics aren't enabled. Specify -GX)

Programs that use the Standard C++ library must be compiled with C++ exception handling enabled. C++ exception handling can be enabled by one of the following methods:

  • Selecting the Enable exception handling option in the C++ Language Category of the C/C++ tab in the Project Settings dialog box.
  • Using the /GX compiler switch.

Why I get compiler error C2146, followed by C2065, and finally C2143, all pointing to the same line in my source

This sequence of errors can be caused by the following type of construct:

vector<int, allocator<int>>iV;

The problem is caused by the consecutive >> at the end of the declaration. The solution is to put a space between two characters, so the construct becomes:

vector<int, allocator<int> > iV;

It's consistent with the proposed ANSII specification.