Why I'm hesitating to switch to D

[bearophile]

James Fisher:

Welcome here.


>Why I'm hesitating to switch to D<

You don't need to "switch" to D. Just using it along with other languages is better.


>The language, maybe, but this statement is absolutely not true while there is no associated package manager.<

It's called advertisement :-)


>a massive "batteries included" standard library is no substitute for a world-class package manager.<
>The productivity gain that comes from being able to execute "dinstall <somepackage>", and then having it magically available, is *immense*.<

Right.


>IMO the big-standard-library is a slightly outdated concept in an age where we're always able to pull stuff from the net in an instant.<

There are several more things I'd like in the D standard distribution. External libs don't avoid the need of a rich Phobos. As most other design things, it's a matter of trade-offs.


>There's an important reason that other languages have squiffy names: searchability.  Googling for "d <query>" is useless, and "d language <query>" is still awful.<

I think it's too much late to fix this for D.


>The point I want to get across here is: the problem with the D programming language *is not that there are problems with the D programming language.* The language and compiler (from what I know) have been world-class for some time.<

Here there is a huge fallacy. I want a well designed language first, with a well debugged compiler that produces efficient binaries. This is the necessary base to build on, to create Phobos, all nice libraries, and tools like package managers and IDEs. A good language without libraries and tools is not so useful, but if you don't create a good language&compiler first, or you don't express the desire to create it, then I am not interested in it (in the world there are languages that are badly designed but are widely used). Regardless its status along its history, it's several years that D aims to be a good language with a good compiler.

Bye,
bearophile