MS extend C++ significantly for Windows8... and Andrei got name drop

[Adam Wilson]

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012 13:35:38 -0800, Manu <turkeyman at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 25 January 2012 21:47, bls <bizprac at orange.fr> wrote:
>
>> On 01/25/2012 07:03 AM, Manu wrote:
>>
>>> This is fairly interesting. MS have extended their C++ compiler
>>> significantly for Windows8 with a bunch of non-standard stuff.
>>> FINALLY implement garbage collection, ref counting, properties,
>>> delegates, events, generics, etc...
>>> If other compilers adopt this tech, D loses some advantages.
>>>
>>
>> But you still have to fight with ifndef ,forward declaration, and a
>> template syntax against common sense.  Even if you paint shit yellow  
>> it's
>> not necessarily gold.
>>
>
> True, but I think this will mitigate a lot of the motivation Windows devs
> have to seek another language if they're not developing cross platform  
> apps.
>
> Sadly, since WinRT requires using these language extensions to interface
> with the new windows runtime, you won't be able to write a Windows8 app  
> in
> D.
> Interestingly though, D supports almost everything they've added to C++.  
> I
> wonder if it would be possible to do extern(Windows8) to produce a
> compatible ABI for linking with MS C++ apps?
>
> The most interesting features are 'ref new' and 'gcnew', which makes me
> wonder, since Windows8 has an OS garbage collector, would it be at all
> possible to have D use the Windows8 GC? I'd prefer this to using D's own  
> GC
> if it would be supported, and obviously this would be a requirement if D
> was going to interact with WinRT properly.
> Also, WinRT uses 'ref new' to allocate ref counted (effectively COM to my
> understanding) objects. I think I read somewhere that D already has
> extern(COM) no? I wonder if Windows8 ref type linkage is already
> technically supported in D?

There is no Win8GC, it's all ref counted. WinRT is COM with extras and as  
such should be accessible to D. It would need some extra glue code over  
what we have now ... like the IInspectable interface.

And yes, I am running Win8.

-- 
Adam Wilson
Project Coordinator
The Horizon Project
http://www.thehorizonproject.org/