I still love C++ Builder, regardless of all Borland misteps that lead to where Embarcadero is today, it is the survivor of C++ RAD IDE tooling, Visual C++ never was as Visual as it name implies.

I get the feeling author would just like to use a better language, like F# or Ocaml, and completely misses the point what makes C++ valuable.

C++ is valuable, because the existing tooling enables you to optimize the runtime peformance of a program (usually you end up with figuring out the best memory layout and utilization).

C++ is valuable becaus it's industry support guarantees code bases live for decades _without the need to modify them_ to latest standards.

C++ is valuable because the industry tooling allows you to verify large areas of the program behaviour at runtime (ASAN etc).

I simply don't understand what type of industrial use this type of theoretical abstraction building serves.

Using the metaprogramming features makes code bases extremly hard to modify and they don't actually protect from a category of runtime errors. I'm speaking from experience.

I would much rather have a codebase with a bit more boilerplate, a bit more unit tests and strong integration testing suite.

The longer I use C++ the more I'm convinced something like Orthodox C++ is the best method to approach the language https://bkaradzic.github.io/posts/orthodoxc++/

This keeps the code maintainable, and performant (with less effor than metaprogramming directed C++).

Note: the above is just an opinion, with a very strong YMMV flavour, coming from two decades in CAD, real time graphics and embedded development.