At what point are you an expert in C++?

Herb Sutter's talk tilted "Back to Basics" (available on YouTube) contains the message "it's easy to forget that you're an expert" in the context of writing code that utilizes the latest complicated features of a language to squeeze out the last drop of performance.

So what makes someone an expert? Is it just writing production code? Is it groking the entire panel presented by a standards committee member? Is it contributing to the STL? Is it when you can write your own compiler while blindfolded and juggling rubber duckies in under 60 seconds?

What makes a person an expert in any language, for that matter?

Never! It is a blasphemy to think otherwise.

@drwhy IMHO you can become an expert on a topic.

But once you are there you will need to continue learning / contributing to stay ahead of the curve. Otherwise your knowledge will become outdated and you should not be called expert anymore

I think there is no specific list of things that you need to have done to be considered an expert on any language.

You just contribute to the community and the language, be it through contributing to projects, writing guides, blogging on design and/or implementation topics, answering questions on StackOverflow or other means.

At some point your name might start getting recognized. If you continue contributing word will spread about you.

Some people will begin considering you an expert. If you continue to make more quality contributions, more and also more experienced people will share that opinion.

So an expert status is something gained through experience and peer review. It also depends who you consider to be an expert. If those people think the same of you, you probably are an expert

I would not take it word-for-word. By working with stuff and getting familiar with it, it's easy to forget how it's seen from a less-familiar perspective.

Also being an expert is shown by being a dick in the internet, as seen on devrant sometimes.