I'll agree that your second example is less readable than the first..
This could be mitigated with the name of foo() being more descriptive.
If the return type is particularly wordy, auto could still be appropriate.
This could be mitigated with the name of foo() being more descriptive.
If the return type is particularly wordy, auto could still be appropriate.
welcome back Hungarian notation
What does this have to do with hungarian notation?
This works better:
auto uasStudents = getClassList()
In this case, “uas” prefix standing for an unsafe array of strings.
Then say you validate the list
auto sasStudents = validate(uasStudents)
(Now it’s a safe array of students!)
The "Hungarian notation" comment is correct - it's not strictly Hungarian notation, but annotating function (or variable) names when the language has a type system representing this same information is the same idea with the same problems as Hungarian notation.
In seriousness, no, that's not what I'm suggesting, and I find it an unusual thing to read from my comment. I'm saying a descriptive name for foo() can give you a hint about what the type is, even if it doesn't literally and directly tell you what the type is.