Comma expression as tuple operator [was Tuples, C#, Java, language

[Don]

Denis Koroskin wrote:
> On Wed, 30 Dec 2009 15:41:58 +0300, justme <justme at somewhere.net> wrote:
> 
>> grauzone Wrote:
>>
>>> bearophile wrote:
>>> > BCS:
>>> >> A though on the comma operator: if the comma operator were defined 
>>> to give
>>> >> a tuple type and be implicitly castable to any suffix of it's 
>>> self, then
>>> >> you could get both the comma expression usage that Walter wants as 
>>> well as
>>> >> all the fun things that tuple expressions give.
>>> >
>>> > D2 has enough warts now, so it's much better to not add some more. 
>>> Languages must be tidy, when possible. It's often better to not have 
>>> a feature that having a dirty one.
>>>
>>> I think in this case, it's more about cleaning up and polishing, than
>>> adding "warts".
>>>
>>> The big danger is, that this may require incompatible language changes,
>>> which won't be possible anymore after D2. D3? Anyone who talks about D3
>>> must be kidding.
>>
>> So D3 won't ever appear? At least in many open source projects the 
>> final released is tagged one to two weeks before the final release. 
>> Distributions have then time to repackage the release. Meanwhile, the 
>> core developers are already enthusiastically implementing wild new 
>> features after a long feature freeze.
>>
>> It's similar kind of tick-tock as Intel has with their CPU line (1 
>> smaller process -> 2 improved core -> goto 1). In successful software 
>> projects they have alpha/beta period, feature freeze, stabilization 
>> period, release, new alpha/beta period etc. Concurrently new bugfix 
>> releases come out just like with D. I haven't heard of new features 
>> lately so D2 must be stabilizing now.
> 
> 
> According to development stages you provided, D2 is currently in 
> alpha/beta period. Feature freeze will follow once TDPL is released 
> (around March, 2010). Stabilization and release is even further, and D3 
> is sooo far away it's hardly imagineable we will see any signs of it in 
> a foreseeable future :)

Yes, that's about right.  Let's get an estimate about stablisation:

There are 1400 open bugs (DMD+Phobos), which are currently being fixed 
at the rate of 50/month.
Historically, new bugs have been found at the rate of 66/month.
Since D2 began, 50% of the open bugs have been D2-only. So, 50% of the 
bugs have been related to new features.
Which would suggest that even if the bug rate halves when after the 
feature freeze, it'll be about 5 years until the bug count drops to 
zero... :-(
Actually, I don't think it's that bad, since some of the most important 
structural compiler bugs have been fixed, which should greatly reduce 
the rate that new bugs are found.
Even so, I'd recommend at least two years of bug-fixes and library 
development (and toolchain issues), before we even think about more 
features.