Rename std.string.toStringz?

[Jonathan M Davis]

On 2011-06-16 10:44, Paul D. Anderson wrote:
> Jonathan M Davis Wrote:
> > 1. Keep toStringz as it is (as well as toUTF16z) and either consider
> > stringz to be some sort of word unique to the D community or just admit
> > that we're not going to camelcase it because it would break too much
> > code to do so.
> 
> vote++.
> 
> 1) If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Too much disruption for too little
> gain.
> 
> 2) In a language that uses "enum" to mean "manifest constant", worrying
> about an upper or lower case z is straining at a gnat and swallowing a
> camel.

It has been made pretty clear in discussions in this group before that in the 
general case, the consensus is that we want Phobos' function names to 
consistently follow Phobos' naming conventions (which means camelcased 
starting with a lowercase letter in the case of functions), even if it means 
breaking code in the short run in order to fix it. So, following that, if 
toStringz isn't properly camelcased (and I really don't understand anyone who 
thinks that it is), then it should be renamed. Whether it's the biggest 
problem in the language or library or not is irrelevant. Based on past 
discussions in this group, one would think that most people would want 
toStringz to be changed to be properly camelcased.

However, it _is_ a function which is used a _lot_ and changing it will break a 
lot of code, so if we change the name, it needs to be worth doing so. I'm just 
trying to find out if the community at large thinks that it's worth changing 
toStringz to be properly camelcased given the cost, and if so, whether it's 
best to just camelcase it properly (toStringZ) or to rename it entirely. It's 
clear that in the general case, the community believes that it's worth it. The 
question is whether they believe that it's worth it in this particular case. I 
don't find whether there are other, bigger issues in the language or library 
to be particularly relevant unless they affect this particular issue.

- Jonathan M Davis