On Friday, 8 May 2015 at 19:59:35 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
On 5/8/2015 7:03 AM, Chris wrote:
The funny thing is that people keep complaining about the lack
of tools for D,
and when a tool is built into the language they say "That tool
shouldn't be part
of the language". Yet, if it were omitted, people would say
"Why doesn't D have
this tool built in?". Human nature, I guess.
I see it slightly differently. If the tool is built in to the
language, people do not regard it as a tool anymore when
preparing a mental checklist of "available tooling".
---- Warning! Another Boring Walter Cutaway -------------
It reminds me of back when we were selling the Zortech C++
compiler, we included complete runtime library source with the
compiler. This was back in the days when most compilers'
library source code was a closely held trade secret.
Nobody noticed that we included the runtime library source.
Then, one day, Borland decided to make their previously trade
secret library source code available as a separate purchase.
They did an amazing job marketing this, and journalists
everywhere celebrated the forward thinking breakthrough. Even
in magazine compiler roundup reviews, the journalists would
breathlessly note that one could now buy Borland's library
source code, but Zortech C++ including it for free was never
mentioned.
We threw in the towel, and made the library source code a
separately priced add on. This was a big success for us!
No, I'm not suggesting we unbundle unit testing, Ddoc, coverage
analysis, profiling, etc., into separate tools for marketing
purposes. I'm just bemused by how perceptions work.
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I love these war stories :)
