Value ranges from contracts?

[bearophile]

(This comes after the recent "Troubles with user defined 
subtypes" post of mine).

Is it a good idea to improve the D value range analysis to 
support code like this?



void foo(immutable int x) pure nothrow
in {
     assert(x >= '0' && x <= '9');
} body {
     char c = x; // error, cast required.
}

void main() {}


Currently you have to write this because, despite that 
pre-condition, the D type system can't see it's a safe assignment:

     char c = cast(char)x;


D ignores lot of potentially useful semantics contained in 
contracts, they are quite under-used. There are languages like 
Whiley that are good at those things, but note this improvement 
of D value range analysis doesn't require flow analyis (unlike 
Whiley because x is immutable, so once the pre-condition pass, x 
is a correct digit in every code paths inside the foo body{}.

http://whiley.org/2012/12/04/generating-verification-conditions-for-whiley/

Bye,
bearophile