On Tuesday, 30 January 2018 at 20:45:44 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu
wrote:
https://www.quora.com/Why-hasnt-D-started-to-replace-C++
Andrei
The Betamax Problem
When you introduce something new, how do you know that it is
going to be compelling enough for people to move from whatever it
is they are doing and use your new thing?
It is not an easy question to answer but in the realm of
programming languages it's a very tough question, because people
are going to have to learn a whole new language, and its going to
come with costs and potentially unquantifiable risks for any
company that attempts to shift to that language. So whatever it
is you are offering has to be tremendously compelling compared to
what is already there.
An important question is what problem set does D solve? It's very
hard to sell a language to industry without convincingly
answering that question. If you are selling them a 'better'
language - that's a tougher sell. If you are selling a solution
to a particular problem set - you stand better a chance.
For a manager to consider D as the successor to C++, it doesn't
just have to be a better language design than C++, it has to have
the best language design of any compiled language and demonstrate
the best performance. Is the former really true? Are various
language features that have been inherited from C++/Java the best
way forward? For instance does D have the best approach to object
oriented programming, or templates? Or any important set of
features you care to mention? Are there things that C++ does
better than D? How straightforward is it to get great performance
from D? Is how do you 'tune' your D code for high performance
obvious or well documented?
If the answers to any of the above questions is a negative for D,
that's a serious problem if what you want to do is replace C++,
because C++ is already a solid well know language and the
competition from new programming languages is extremely tough,
and because its only going to get easier to create programming
languages this competition will get tougher.
To finish the Betamax story, when CD came along, people dropped
cassette tapes like hot potatoes and DVDs killed VHS stone dead.
Does D represent a similar leap from C++?
I'm not saying that D is Betamax. I'm just giving food for
thought.
