Wish: Variable Not Used Warning

[superdan]

Nick Sabalausky Wrote:

> As just a few examples:
> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/1.0/warnings.html

yarp i'm so happy you sent those. let's take'em 1 by 1. please let me know agree or disagree. 

1. warning - implicit conversion of expression expr of type type to type can cause loss of data

it's a shame this is allowed at all. any conversion that involves a loss must require a cast right there. as far as the example give goes:

byte a, b;
byte c = a + b;

compiler can't know a + b is in byte range so a cast is good. but take this now:

byte c = a & b;

in this case the compiler must accept code. so what i'm saying is that better operator types will help a ton.

2. warning - array 'length' hides other 'length' name in outer scope

i seem to recall andrei pissed on this one until it dissolved into the fucking ground. can't agree more. it is a crying shame that this stupid length thing is still in the language. just get rid of it already.

3. warning - no return at end of function

now what a sick decision was it to accept that in the first place. an overwhelming percentage of functions *can* and *will* be written to have a meaningful return at the end. then why the fuck cater for the minority and hurt everybody else. just require a return or throw and call it a day. people who can't return something meaningful can just put a throw. code growth is negligible. impact on speed is virtually nil. why the hell do we even bother arguing over it.

4. warning - switch statement has no default

another example of a motherfuck. just require total coverage. in closed-set cases i routinely write anyway:

switch (crap) 
{
case a: ...; break;
case b: ...; break;
default: assert(crap == c): ...; break;
}

again: vast majority of code already has a default. the minority just has to add a little code. make it an error.

5. warning - statement is not reachable

this is a tad more messy. people routinely insert a premature return in there to check for stuff. it pisses me off when that won't compile. i discovered i could do this:

if (true) return crap;

that takes care of the error. and i think it's actually good for me because it really is supposed to be temporary code. it jumps at me in a review. as it should.