Misc questions:- licensing, VC++ IDE compatible, GPGPU, LTCG, QT, SDL

[BCS]

Hello Dan,

> Hi all, I'm toying around with the idea of porting my raytracer
> codebase to D. But before committing, I have a few rookie questions:
> 
> 1: What kind of license is the D compiler under? I'm thinking of
> shipping a commercial, close sourced (for now) program with the D
> compiler (so that users can compile within the GUI). Is this possible
> to do, or can I least pay for the priviledge?

The front end is under an Open Source (R) license. The backbend is open source 
but only in that you can see the source. Several projects combine the front 
end with a FOOS back end than can b shipped but you can't ship copies of 
the official exe without Walters ok but he's been know to give it at no cost 
if you ask really nicely.

> 2: Is it possible to use D with the Visual C++ IDE? Preferably, I
> would like the apprepriate compiler and D options listed in the
> options (in place of the usual c/c++ options).

There is a D plugin that recently got posted that allows that. I've never 
got it working but I think that's me FUBARing VS.

> 3: I need my program to be as fast as possible. The Visual C++
> compiler has features such as "link-time code generation" and "Profile
> guided optimization". Does D have equivalents?

For link time code generation: you might get the same effect via templates 
(they are way easier under D than C++). As for the other, I think DMD can 
do some of that but I don't remember the details.

> 5: How about compatibility with GPGPU stuff like CUDA and OpenCL?

I remember seeing some work in that direction about 2-3 years ago. If you 
can get a C API to that stuff, you can do it in D. There might be a wrapper 
somewhere that gives an API that's cleaner to use from D.

> Can I just as easily write GPGPU programs which run as fast as I can with 
C/C++?

Assuming a reasonable API, you should be able to whip out D code to interact 
with CUDA/OpenCL at least as fast as you can write the same in C/C++.


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