See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 4: Virtual Functions
See part 5: Explicit and Partial Specialization
See part 6: New C++11 features added to the Visual C++ 2012 compiler (CTP)
See part 7: Usual Arithmetic Conversions and Template Metaprogramming
See part 8: do-while loop, casts, one definition rule

See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 4: Virtual Functions
See part 5: Explicit and Partial Specialization
See part 6: New C++11 features added to the Visual C++ 2012 compiler (CTP)
See part 7: Usual Arithmetic Conversions and Template Metaprogramming

See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 4: Virtual Functions
See part 5: Explicit and Partial Specialization
See part 6: New C++11 features added to the Visual C++ 2012 compiler (CTP)

This compiler is now available as a Customer Technology Preview release to everyone. If you want to test-drive this new compiler too, download it from here: http://aka.ms/vc-ctp. More details on this release are available on Visual C++ Blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/vcblog/).

Make sure to watch Herb Sutter's C++ keynote at BUILD 2012.

See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 4: Virtual Functions
See part 5: Explicit and Partial Specialization

From MSDN ->

Class templates can be specialized for specific types or values of the template arguments. Specialization allows template code to be customized for a specific argument type or value. Without specialization, the same code is generated for each type used in a template instantiation. In a specialization, when the specific types are used, the definition for the specialization is used instead of the original template definition. A specialization has the same name as the template of which it is a specialization. However, a template specialization can be different in many ways from the original template. For example, it can have different data members and member functions.

Use specialization to customize a template for a specific type or value. Use partial specialization when the template has more than one template argument and you only need to specialize one of them, or when you want to specialize behavior for an entire set of types, such as all pointer types, reference types, or array types.

// explicit_specialization1.cpp
// compile with: /EHsc
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

// Template class declaration and definition
template <class T> class Formatter
{
   T* m_t;
public:
   Formatter(T* t) : m_t(t) { }
   void print()
   {
      cout << *m_t << endl;
   }
};

// Specialization of template class for type char*
template<> class Formatter<char*>
{
   char** m_t;
public:
   Formatter(char** t) : m_t(t) { }
   void print()
   {
      cout << "Char value: " << **m_t << endl;
   }
};

int main()
{
   int i = 157;
   // Use the generic template with int as the argument.
   Formatter<int>* formatter1 = new Formatter<int>(&i);

   char str[10] = "string1";
   char* str1 = str;
   // Use the specialized template.
   Formatter<char*>* formatter2 = new Formatter<char*>(&str1);

   formatter1->print();
   formatter2->print();
}

See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 4: Virtual Functions

Tune in. Learn.

See part 1: Name Lookup
See part 2: Template Argument Deduction
See part 3: Overload Resolution
See part 5: Explicit and Partial Specialization

As STL says: "I walk through why foo(const T&) beats foo(const T *), when given int *. The reason is surprisingly subtle."

Tune in.

Tune in. Learn.

See part 1: Name Lookup

Remember Herb Sutter's great GotW post (#30, to be precise) on Name Lookup? Here's the problem from that post, to refresh your memory (Thanks to Herb for providing information like this on GotW!):

In the following code, which functions are called? Why? Analyze the implications?

namespace A {
      struct X;
      struct Y;
      void f( int );
      void g( X );
}

namespace B {
       void f( int i ) {
            f( i );   // which f()?
        }
        void g( A::X x ) {
             g( x );   // which g()?
        }
        void h( A::Y y ) {
             h( y );   // which h()?
        }
 }

We recommend you watch this entire episode before playing around with Herb's sample above (and don't read the GotW answer, either! That's cheating. Learn from STL. He's an outstanding teacher, as you know.)

Please supply feedback on this thread, especially as it relates to what you'd like STL to focus on in subsequent episodes. For part 2, STL will focus on Template Argument Deduction.

Tune in. Enjoy. Learn.