dst = src rather than src dst

[Janice Caron]

-----Original Message-----
From: digitalmars-d-bounces at puremagic.com 
[mailto:digitalmars-d-bounces at puremagic.com] On Behalf Of Jarrett Billingsley
Sent: 05 September 2007 14:43
To: digitalmars-d at puremagic.com
Subject: Re: dst = src rather than src dst

> I doubt this will ever change,

Mebbe. But there's no harm in asking!


> so to help you get used to the current syntax, <snip>
> Think of them like a variable declaration,

Sure, but alias is also used to importing symbols into the current namespace. A 
good example in D 2.0+ would be

 struct B
 {
     A super_A;
     alias super_A this;
 }

Here the intent is not to declare a variable, but to alias the symbol this. 
Similarly

  class Derived : Base
  {
      int f();
      alias f f;
  }

Which brings the implementations of f defined in Base into Derived. On a 
similar note:

 alias std.path.join join;

might be used to disambiguate between std.path.join and std.string.join. In all 
of these cases, you are /not/ declaring a variable, you are pulling symbol 
definitions into the current namespace, so your mneumonic doesn't work. I'm not 
knocking it, mind. I'm just saying these would be more readable as (for 
example)

 alias join = std.path.join;

Or at least, I think so. Also, type expressions are now becoming more common, 
and frankly

 typedef Tx = typeof(x);

is self-explanatory. In any case, I wasn't necessarily suggesting that the old 
syntax be scrapped, merely that new syntax be allowed.