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@ symbol in C++ comments

I'm learning C++, and while setting up VS Code I found the following in one of its tutorials.

It's just a demo program. But my question is about the convention of using the @ symbol in the comments as... titles?

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <string>

using namespace std;

/**
* @brief An example program. This program demonstrates simple vector storage and element iteration.
*        A welcome string is output to the user.
*
* @return Returns 0 when execution completes succesfully.
*/

int main() {
   ...
}

It's just a style question.

Solution

  • @ is a symbol used by a tool, Doxygen, that parses the source file and turns the marked comments into more formal documentation.

    For details see Documenting the Code in the Doxygen documentation.