What is the advantage of using anonymous functions compared to regular functions in programming?

Anonymous functions (lambda expressions) have several advantages over regular named functions:

• Locality: they allow defining a function right where it is needed, improving code readability and maintainability.
• Convenience of passing: they are easily passed as arguments to other functions, simplifying work with callbacks and functional style.
• Closures: they can capture variables from the surrounding context, which is not possible with regular functions without additional constructs.

Example in C++:

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <algorithm>

int main() {
    std::vector<int> nums = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5};
    int factor = 2;
    std::for_each(nums.begin(), nums.end(), [factor](int &n) { n *= factor; });
    for (int n : nums) std::cout << n << " "; // Will output: 2 4 6 8 10
}

Here, the anonymous function multiplies each element by factor, capturing it from the external context.