string types: const(char)[] and cstring

[Bill Baxter]

Oskar Linde wrote:
> Myron Alexander skrev:
>> noSpam wrote:
>>> Walter Bright wrote:
>>>> Derek Parnell wrote:
>>>>>  const(char)[]  // A mutable array of immutable characters?
>>>>>  const(char[])  // An immutable array of mutable characters?
>>>>>  const(const(char)[]) // An immutable array of immutable characters?
>>>>>  char[]         // A mutable array of mutable characters?
>>>>>
>>>>> What will happen with the .reverse and .sort array properties when 
>>>>> used
>>>>> with const, invariant, and final qualifiers?
>>>>
>>>> They'll all fail.
>>>
>>> I think it's better to return reversed/sorted copy. This will make 
>>> such change more backward compatibile.
>>
>> This makes sense. For immutable arrays, the definition should drop "in 
>> place" and just return a copy.
> 
> Which would be very confusing. This is instead a perfect opportunity to 
>  take the *much* better path of finally depreciating the .sort and 
> .reverse "properties". Equally good or better library implementations 
> are possible (and exists). For example, .sort can't take an ordering 
> predicate. 

+1 (and thanks for your predicate-accepting sort routine, Oskar!)

> Also, the special casing of reversing char[] and wchar[] 
> arrays, preserving the encoded unicode code points is definitely (imho) 
> too specialized to belong in the language (runtime) as opposed to a 
> library.

No opinion there.  What about the special code-point-at-a-time foreach 
for char[]?  Do you dislike that too?

--bb