Managed Extensions for C++

Managed Extensions for C++, also called Managed C++, is a deprecated set of grammatical and syntactic extensions, keywords and attributes that Microsoft created so that C++ code could target the .NET Framework and its Common Language Runtime as managed code while still interoperating with native code. It first shipped in Microsoft Visual C++ 2002 and was kept in the 2003 and 2005 releases. Programs written in it compile to Common Intermediate Language rather than directly to native instructions, gain garbage collection from the runtime, and can call both other .NET languages and standard C++, which made it a common bridge between the two worlds. It supports templates but not generics, and a garbage collected class cannot inherit from more than one class. In 2004 Microsoft replaced it with the revised C++/CLI design, which is why the Managed C++ name is now obsolete.