D vs. C#

[Roberto Mariottini]

Walter Bright wrote:
> Roberto Mariottini wrote:
[...]
>> And not only that: if my product is compiled for Java-CLDC it will 
>> work on any cell phone that support CLDC, based on any kind of 
>> processor/architecture, included those I don't know of, included even 
>> those that today don't exist and will be made in the future.
> 
> Javascript is distributed in source code, and executes on a variety of 
> machines. A VM is not necessary to achieve portability to machines 
> unknown. What is necessary is a portable language design.

Obviously, this is valid only if you want to distribute the sources, and 
sometimes you can't (i.e. royalties, sublicensing and the like).

We are still talking only of the implementation, not the language 
itself. I consider the Javascript environment as a high level VM, and I 
still think that a compiled Javascript would be unusable.

Even if technically the big difference between portable and non-portable 
resides on the language and the standard libraries, I think that not 
considering the hundreds of working VMs that exist today is narrow-thinking.
To force developers to distribute their sources excludes a big part of 
the software world as it is today.
Making D compilable for the Java VM today would make it immediately 
portable to tens of platforms (and hundreds of cell phones models), today.

Ciao