[Issue 1869] Semantically returning an array from a funciton is difficult

[d-bugmail at puremagic.com]

http://d.puremagic.com/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=1869





------- Comment #15 from andrei at metalanguage.com  2008-02-26 10:53 -------
(In reply to comment #14)
> Thanks for the comments, it's more or less as I suspected. The ways of
> returning an arrays pointed out by Janice Caron and others seem to feel like a
> 'workaround' to me.
> 
> I don't quite understand why the code below does not (or cannot work). The pass
> by reference semantics of arrays don't have to apply for function return do
> they? It might create a special case though I suppose.
> 
> 
> int[4][4] f()
> {
>     int a[4][4];
>     return a;
> }

This will work. We'll also pass arrays in by value, and will bind literals to
dynamically-sized arrays.

In response to Derek: this is the "right thing" because every type in D has the
same copy semantics whether it sits inside a struct or not. Every type...
except statically-sized arrays. 


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