auto, var, raii,scope, banana

[Nils Hensel]

Don Clugston schrieb:
> Nils Hensel wrote:
>> I'm sorry but I don't believe there are many programmers out there 
>> actually using something as undescriptive as "var" as a regular 
>> identifier. 
> 
> Maybe my first impression of the google search yourself -- the data is 
> there.
I guess there are regular "var" users then but when I said "programmers"
I was thinking of professionals used to the idiosyncrasies of medium to
large software projects, where you're often faced with working on and
maintaining someone elses code. I guess if the best description of a
variable's intended meaning this somebody could come up with was "var"
I'd be pretty pissed pretty soon.


>> I don't intend to insult Don in any way but it's a horrible practice 
>> IMNSHO that should not be preserved.
> 
> I don't understand. I can't see the difference between 'var' and 'x'.
> Do you also dislike use of 'i' as a counter variable in a for loop?
> (And if not, what is the difference?)
'x' and 'i' are often used in mathematical formulas and contexts so they
already bear a meaning even if they look indescriptive. OTOH if someone
uses 'i' as a string or a boolean variable I WOULD consider it a bad 
practice as well.


> 'var' is inappropriate in a statically typed language. Remember that 
> 'static's are variables too. Note that 'auto' was one of the original C 
> keywords, and was chosen without any constraint (no legacy code 
> whatsoever, they could have chosen any name, including 'var'). Every 
> variable was classed into either:
> 
> static
> auto
> register
To be frank I don't get your point here. "static", "auto" and "register" 
are storage classes in these contexts (as they are originally in D). C 
has no concept of type inference. "auto" just means that the memory 
management for these variables is dealt with automatically because these 
variables exist on the stack.
D just uses the fact that "auto" signifies the declaration of a variable 
  which allows the compiler to identify the type automatically  through 
the initializing value. The same holds true for "static" and "const". So 
actually D doesn't have an explicit type inference keyword yet.



>> Also I don't think that it's a good habit to be looking at how C++ 
>> does something unless one is looking for a bad example. My main reason 
>> for interest in D is because personally I'm fed up with C++ and 
>> consider it an abomination and a major PITA.
> 
> Agreed, but the 'auto' thing ultimately comes from C, not C++.
Yes, but not in the context of type inference. So the C "auto" is 
totally different from it's current D counterpart.

Regards,
Nils