What exactly is or was the purpose of C++ function-style casts?

Question

I am talking about \"type(value)\"-style casts. The books I have read pass over them quickly, saying only that they are semantically equivalent to C-style casts, \"(type) va

Answer 1

It is somewhat easier to parse the function-style casts in a language where parentheses are already heavily (over-)used.

Were they a mistake? Possibly - but only to the extent that they were unable to completely supersede the C-style casts, and therefore provided a Perl-like "there's more than one way to do it" mechanism for casting. With the explicit and distinctive modern casts:

dynamic_cast(value);
reinterpret_cast(value);
static_cast(value);
const_cast(value);

there is no reason to use the C-style casts any more, and less reason to use function-style casts.