On Mon, 11 May 2009 18:28:22 -0500, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote: > Derek Parnell wrote: >> The D-Team should be dedicating resources to ensuring that the D1 >> implementation and D1 documentation are in alignment with each other. >> By dedicating, I mean that is all that this D1-subteam of the D-Team >> work on - no D2 work at all. Any D1 fixes that need to be propagated >> to D2 should be done by the D2-subteam. Priority should be given to >> getting D1 completed. > > Well thank you General :o).
In spite of the smiley, I'm still feel that your "General" comment is out-of-line and not fair. If one cannot give opinions here then why do we bother. > Derek, I have all respect for you and your contributions to D. The > response below does not have the slightest intent to pick on you but to > rein in an unhelpful pattern in this group. Thank you and I understand. > I invite you to see the paragraph quoted above through a different pair > of eyes - the eyes of someone with a different vision of what should be > done for D, and also (most importantly) who believes in it strongly > enough to invest their own non-existing free time in effecting that > vision. (btw, what exactly is that vision, and why do you think that it is different from mine?) > I confess that this couch quarterbacking is mightily frustrating for > both Walter and myself. All the pieces are there for anyone with a > vision to make it happen. I understand you wanted to share your opinion > on what would be best for the future of D, and that's laudable in and by > itself, but such opinions have lately become a choir of whines > fulfilling a "if I want something from D, and I expect Walter to do it" > pattern. We need the exact opposite - if you care, what can *you* do to > make D better? D needs action and leadership. I can only speak for myself here but I am not expecting Walter to do it all. In fact, I expect Walter to delegate tasks to others, but I get the feeling that is not the norm. I cannot influence in any practical manner what happens to D1. I cannot code in C++ (effectively) so I'm unable to contribute to fixing bugs. I cannot add to Phobos as 'additions' are closed. I could improve the unit tests and documentation, but ... well, I might be a little behind the times, for the mechanisms for contributing code changes to Phobos and the documentation have been, for me, counter-productive. It is not a simple process and there is no feeling that my efforts will even make a difference. Your phrase "All the pieces are there" needs to be fleshed out, I think. Are you referring to the process that enables one to submit work for consideration into D? If so, what exactly is that process - Bugzilla is fine for issues and bugs, but is that also the method that we need to use for documentation updates and unit tests? > And why is D1 not finished? Most "finished" languages have > implementation insufficiencies. I've read a couple of days ago that D1 > is unfinished (and unusable by implication) because contracts aren't > inherited. If I were Walter, that would be the exact kind of claim that > causes high blood pressure. This is ridiculous! Is *that* the feature > that the building of a system hinges on? Is that really what's stopping > you? Then go back and use contracts in C++, Java, or C#. My guess is, if > anyone is whining that D1 is unusable because it doesn't have contract > inheritance, tomorrow (should contract inheritance be fixed) they'll > whine that it doesn't have named arguments, template virtuals, or a > gorram cherry on top. Sheesh. I realize your remarks above were not specifically directed towards myself, however I feel the need to respond. I am not saying that D1 is not finished, but I am saying that DMD-v1 is not finished. D1 documentation says X is a function of D1. DMD-v1 does not implement X. Therefore DMD-v1 is not a complete implementation of D1. Even though D1 is finished, DMD-v1 might not be finished. Either the documentation is wrong or DMD-v1 is not complete yet. I do not automatically associate incompleteness with unusable. They are not the same thing. There exists complete things that are unusable and incomplete things that are usable. I believe that D1 is very suitable for production applications today. DMD-v1 has a level of stability and completeness that enables it to be used for important works right now. I choose not to use D1 for totally different reasons that have nothing to do with functionality or defect rates. -- Derek Parnell Melbourne, Australia skype: derek.j.parnell