D: A language without focus

[clayasaurus]

Disclaimer: 21 year old student who just uses D for a hobby.

gabe wrote:
> 
> Arrow One: The Message

The D language does have docs, tutorials, a compiler, and build tools. D 
does have a debugger, but not 100% (GDB and windb). I guess D has 
potentially as many networking tools as C/C++, it just requires effort 
to port over. For system analysis, does code coverage count/profiler 
count? While D doesn't have as many options as Java (and doesn't have 
support of Sun), it is possible to get by on D. D also has an Open 
Source compiler(GDC), so I don't think 'closed source' is a D problem. I 
think D's biggest lack of adoption stems from is 'beta' status, all of 
us here are early adopters. I'm not sure about 'packaging tools,' I 
thought about installers but those are language independent. In 
addition, the D community is very resourceful with helping others use 
the language, I still ask questions every once and a while and I get 
prompt responses back.


> None of those things can really be said for D. First, you don't have a fully
> functional, stress-tested compiler. 

It has gone through a lot of stress testing, just look at Dstress or the 
bugs list and change log. D is fairly stable.

>Second, you have poor documentation, and
> what documentation you do have is either written tersely, poorly, or scattered
> to hell-and-gone. 

I've never had a problem with it, but maybe I'm just a newbie. Care to 
give specifics?

> Third, you have absolutely no focus: there are dozens of
> projects out there planning to build the 'next big utility/tool/ide/whatever',
> but hardly any of them seem to be terribly concerned with the fact that D's
> libraries rest on pretty shakey ground. 

Except Ares and Mango perhaps that realize D's libraries are on shaky 
ground?

I myself I am not trying to write the next big 'thing,' I simply use it 
and open my source, but the libraries have been good to me, at least.

> In short, the D library is a joke. 

#1) Have you used it?
#2) How could it be made better?

I wouldn't consider Phobos a joke, but maybe I'm not knowledgeable 
enough on the subject.

> Have
> any of you perused the glibc recently, or the java.* packages? Notice anything
> interesting about these projects? If you thought something like 'this has a
> stunning wealth of library functionality and documentation', you'll probably see
> where I'm going with this. We're not talking about advanced JavaBeans and
> ServerFaces, gtkhtml+, or any one of a dozen other amazingly diverse and
> specialized fields -- we're talking about the bare essentials here. 

If we are talking about bare essentials, then how has anyone been able 
to do anything at all with D? Do we all just look at phobo's source? 
Maybe the docs could use a bit more work, however they work fine for me.

> And nothing
> is more important for a language's success than those primary libraries. You can
> go over to the 'Ares' forum, where I posted a comment on how a potential library
> should be structured. There has to be an interface for programmers, and it's up
> to the D community to provide those fundamental interpretations and guidelines.

True. Good things take time, we have Phobos now and Ares later.

> 
> Arrow Two: Liscenses.
> It's all about the liscenses. Take a look around the programming world and look
> at the most active developer communities -- the Linux kernel, the Apache
> project, the Eclipse project. Each one of these communities shares one startling
> thing in common: they are all, from front to back, from first line to last, open
> source. 

GDC is a full D compiler implementation that is 100% Open Source.

> The problem with
> D, as I see it, is the ambiguous and somewhat offputting liscensing terms of the
> D libraries and compilers.

Phobos license: public domain and artistic, what's wrong there?
GDC: GPL (i think)

> Don't get me wrong -- I don't necessarily hate Microsoft -- but I do think that
> a lot of people who use Microsoft have been bamboozled into thinking that the
> only way that they're going to acheive commercial success is by assuring
> everyone that you're working with that everything will remain strictly
> confidential. 

I don't think Walter's in this for commercial success, but rather for 
respect, or maybe because he's spent too long on C++, I don't really 
know. However, if Walter were like Microsoft we would have no linux 
support and the front end would be closed source.

> Arrow Third: Solidarity and conformance.
> 

Agree, I think. :-P

> 
> Exclamation Solutions:

Agree here too: We need to share a common vision.

> 
> I would like to post some more ideas about this, and I'd like to start
> organizing those people who are interested in joining together. I'd like to hear
> back from the community about this. I'd like to hear back from people excited
> about making D the best possible language it can be -- and making programming in
> D an absolute joy.

Ut oh, sounds like a committee. It is time? Or are you simply trying to 
rally the open source efforts? :-P