On Thursday, 24 October 2013 at 18:14:42 UTC, Jonathan M Davis
wrote:
On Wednesday, October 23, 2013 14:39:21 Suliman wrote:
It would be great to have updated TDPL book...
I don't understand why people keep saying that. Is it because
people keep
repeating that incorrect assumption that it's out-of-date? Or
is it just that
too many people have the impression that D has changed
drastically since TDPL
was released? Almost nothing in TDPL is out-of-date, and for
the most part,
the stuff that is out-of-date is out-of-date because it has
never been
implemented and not because something has changed.
I think your typical user (not one who works on D or phobos
itself) runs into difficulties that take skill, understanding and
sometimes knowledge of D history to work around and feel
comfortable. The whole transitive mutability was a huge time sync
for me and I would have liked more guidance. For instance, TDPL
covers it, but it does not take you into the pitfalls of using it
or the right/wrong way to scale with it. It does not detail the
issues with associative arrays, for example. It does a great
"this is how it works and here are the promised benefits" - but
issues come up that make it feel harder to use. I love D, but so
far I have to say it is a language that can make you feel stupid.
With C++ there is less of that because the expectations are it is
difficult and a PITA.
http://forum.dlang.org/post/mailman.1762.1373097795.13711.digitalmar...@puremagic.com
If some of the stuff that's been discussed in the newsgroup
gets implemented
(e.g. getting rid of toString, opEquals, toHash, and opCmp from
Object), then
TDPL will over time become more out-of-date and more incorrect,
but at this
point, the main problem is the errata. I could see someone
wanting a new
addition that described features that have been added since
then (e.g. UDAs),
but that list is quite short. If anything, the problem with
TDPL is that some
of what it describes still hasn't been implemented yet, and
that list is also
quite short. It explicitly avoided discussing things that
weren't considered a
sure thing at the time, so it's largely still correct and
relevant.
You may be right. Maybe TDPL is not lacking for falling behind
the language too much. It is also great at teaching C.S. concepts
beyond the D language in general. But if you really want to know
how to successfully use D, which is what people want from TDPL,
it needs more. Either a second edition, or a different more
advanced book, a cookbook, an effective ways book.
I really think that it's far too early for a new edition of
TDPL. If we need
more of anything, it's more online tutorials and articles on D,
not a new
edition of TDPL.
- Jonathan M Davis
I wish you would write a book :-)
Thanks
Dan
