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D might not be better from the glance over it, but it's little things in it that REALLY add up. I strongly recommend anyone who ever wrote C++ code to give it a

D might not be better from the glance over it, but it's little things in it that REALLY add up. I strongly recommend anyone who ever wrote C++ code to give it a go for at least a couple of months and see for themselves. That is the best way to measure - I can only give you my sincere recommendation to try it out.

shin_lao 17y ago
It looks great, I agree. I like the range approach for the standard library. I also like the end of the include nightmare. Is the output binary as good as a C++ one? That would be my first purely technical concern. Other concerns would be related to the building tool chain and the quality of IDEs. But the real concern is business oriented. For pet projects I'd be inclined to give a green light. It's always nice to play with new technologies as it opens your mind and give you new ideas. For full fledged commercial products you expect to live several years, that's going to be a solid red light. I wouldn't take the risk of using an unsupported language.
- Keyframe 17y ago
  "I like the range approach for the standard library" This is D2 - I don't use D2 and wouldn't use it. I was talking about D1/Tango combination. I don't think I'll make a switch to D2. "Is the output binary as good as a C++ one? That would be my first purely technical concern." That depends on the compiler/linker, of course. In short - dmd good enough, ldc great (llvm as the backend after all). "Other concerns would be related to the building tool chain and the quality of IDEs." You can download DMD/Tango package from their Trac page and you're ready to go, however I would strongly advise you to use SVN tango version - which implies you need MSYS(on Windows) to build it. Ask for help on forum there (dsource.org/projects/tango) or on irc d.tango (freenode). As for IDE, you can use Descent for Eclipse, as some people do. I use Emacs for everything though, same applies for D - there is a module for it. "But the real concern is business oriented." There is no concern here, since basics of risk management should tell you not to use it. Same applies for other emerging or obscure technologies as well (I'm looking at you Lisp). Short answer, don't use it for business critical things yet, though some have done that with success.
  - shin_lao 17y ago
    I'm curious, why don't you want to do the switch to D2? Is it because it's not mature enough?
    - steveklabnik 17y ago
      First of all, D2 is not mature at all. It's like asking "Is C++0x mature enough?" Secondly, lots of people won't ever switch to D2, even when it's done, because they feel that it adds a lot of feature bloat for very little gain.
      - ponce 17y ago
        I don't think many-cores compatibility is a little gain.
        steveklabnik 17y ago
        That's a compiler issue, not a language issue.
        ponce 17y ago
        A language without purity / proper constness / powerful static checking will not be automatically parallelized.
        h3r3tic 17y ago
        Wrong. D2 has features to ease multi-threaded development, so it's a language 'issue'.
    - Keyframe 17y ago
      There are several reasons. I'll try to list them, but it might not be complete: - D2 looks and feels foreign to me as a somewhat D1 experienced user - Templates maelstrom and strong emphasis on them - D1 grew organically, D2 looks like an academic exercise where stuff is put in just for the sake of it by the people that don't write programs in D at all (Andrei) - D2 book and Andrei are a filibuster for D2 - Walter Bright listens to Andrei (ok, a smart guy) but he doesn't write D programs, I doubt even Walter writes them (seriously). If you look at his code, it is more of a C in D than D code. - I have little to no trust in DMD/OPTLINK, LDC/LLVM is what I'm after and that front is D1 only, and looks like it will be - Lots of people smarter than I am are on D1 also (Tango, namely) - and I don't want to go against the trend since it would isolate me from little support I can get these are just of top of my head, there are more. General summation could lead to "It just doesn't feel right" - at least for me as a heavy D1 user.
- WalterBright 17y ago
  D started 10 years ago. It's not a flash in the pan.
- ponce 17y ago
  Unsupported is a bit strong. "For pet projects I'd be inclined to give a green light. It's always nice to play with new technologies as it opens your mind and give you new ideas." I had no success in learning another languages now that I know D... be cautious :p "For full fledged commercial products you expect to live several years, that's going to be a solid red light. I wouldn't take the risk of using an unsupported language." I would have said that a year ago, but it becomes less true over time. You are likely to encounter less bugs in D1 than one year ago. DMD is released frequently, usually fixing a lots of bugs you didn't even worried about. All problems other than compiler bugs aren't really blocking. There is also bugs in C++ compilers.

shin_lao 17y ago

It looks great, I agree. I like the range approach for the standard library. I also like the end of the include nightmare. Is the output binary as good as a C++ one? That would be my first purely technical concern. Other concerns would be related to the building tool chain and the quality of IDEs. But the real concern is business oriented. For pet projects I'd be inclined to give a green light. It's always nice to play with new technologies as it opens your mind and give you new ideas. For full fledged commercial products you expect to live several years, that's going to be a solid red light. I wouldn't take the risk of using an unsupported language.

Keyframe 17y ago
"I like the range approach for the standard library" This is D2 - I don't use D2 and wouldn't use it. I was talking about D1/Tango combination. I don't think I'll make a switch to D2. "Is the output binary as good as a C++ one? That would be my first purely technical concern." That depends on the compiler/linker, of course. In short - dmd good enough, ldc great (llvm as the backend after all). "Other concerns would be related to the building tool chain and the quality of IDEs." You can download DMD/Tango package from their Trac page and you're ready to go, however I would strongly advise you to use SVN tango version - which implies you need MSYS(on Windows) to build it. Ask for help on forum there (dsource.org/projects/tango) or on irc d.tango (freenode). As for IDE, you can use Descent for Eclipse, as some people do. I use Emacs for everything though, same applies for D - there is a module for it. "But the real concern is business oriented." There is no concern here, since basics of risk management should tell you not to use it. Same applies for other emerging or obscure technologies as well (I'm looking at you Lisp). Short answer, don't use it for business critical things yet, though some have done that with success.
- shin_lao 17y ago
  I'm curious, why don't you want to do the switch to D2? Is it because it's not mature enough?
  - steveklabnik 17y ago
    First of all, D2 is not mature at all. It's like asking "Is C++0x mature enough?" Secondly, lots of people won't ever switch to D2, even when it's done, because they feel that it adds a lot of feature bloat for very little gain.
    - ponce 17y ago
      I don't think many-cores compatibility is a little gain.
      - steveklabnik 17y ago
        That's a compiler issue, not a language issue.
        ponce 17y ago
        A language without purity / proper constness / powerful static checking will not be automatically parallelized.
        h3r3tic 17y ago
        Wrong. D2 has features to ease multi-threaded development, so it's a language 'issue'.
  - Keyframe 17y ago
    There are several reasons. I'll try to list them, but it might not be complete: - D2 looks and feels foreign to me as a somewhat D1 experienced user - Templates maelstrom and strong emphasis on them - D1 grew organically, D2 looks like an academic exercise where stuff is put in just for the sake of it by the people that don't write programs in D at all (Andrei) - D2 book and Andrei are a filibuster for D2 - Walter Bright listens to Andrei (ok, a smart guy) but he doesn't write D programs, I doubt even Walter writes them (seriously). If you look at his code, it is more of a C in D than D code. - I have little to no trust in DMD/OPTLINK, LDC/LLVM is what I'm after and that front is D1 only, and looks like it will be - Lots of people smarter than I am are on D1 also (Tango, namely) - and I don't want to go against the trend since it would isolate me from little support I can get these are just of top of my head, there are more. General summation could lead to "It just doesn't feel right" - at least for me as a heavy D1 user.
WalterBright 17y ago
D started 10 years ago. It's not a flash in the pan.
ponce 17y ago
Unsupported is a bit strong. "For pet projects I'd be inclined to give a green light. It's always nice to play with new technologies as it opens your mind and give you new ideas." I had no success in learning another languages now that I know D... be cautious :p "For full fledged commercial products you expect to live several years, that's going to be a solid red light. I wouldn't take the risk of using an unsupported language." I would have said that a year ago, but it becomes less true over time. You are likely to encounter less bugs in D1 than one year ago. DMD is released frequently, usually fixing a lots of bugs you didn't even worried about. All problems other than compiler bugs aren't really blocking. There is also bugs in C++ compilers.