D versionning

[SomeDude]

On Sunday, 15 July 2012 at 20:50:47 UTC, Patrick Stewart wrote:
>> OTOH, it may break the community yet again, which we certainly 
>> don't want, probably even less than breaking code.
>> Also, the example of Python with two main stable branches that 
>> live in parallel is not very encouraging.
>
> Also, check Python website: they recommend python v2 for all 
> new users that don't know what to choose. They are both stable, 
> but v2 has more libraries, and they do reassure them by saying 
> v2 will be supported for time to come.
>
> On the other hand, on D website, D1 is pushed to the dark 
> corners as ugly half child nobody should know about, and D2 is 
> titled as thing to chose without thinking. And there is no 
> mentioning D1 is relatively stable, while D2 is still unstable, 
> non conforming to D documentation and that some things just 
> don't work, while in constant beta flux that breaks things on 
> regular basis with each release.
>
> So tell me again, which language treats its users with more 
> respect ? Which one encourages users more to use them?

The problem I raised is not a problem of respect. It's a problem 
of community. The D community is a tiny fraction of the Python 
community. It has been steadily growing this last year and a half 
or so, but it's still fragile. The D1/D2 split basically set it 
back to near zero for several years, with many people leaving, 
only a few staying, and a number recently coming back.

The project certainly can't afford yet another split, or many key 
people will simply throw the towel. I for one would rather see 
part of the users quitting than active members.

As for the stability of D2, upir opinion may be different, but it 
has largely improved recently due to increased forces, as several 
people have noted (David Simcha in a recent thread said something 
about the stability of the compiler being good enough that he 
only rarely encountered a problem). And considering the rate of 
bugs correction, it will continue to improve. You only need to 
have a look at the changelog to see that it's growing with each 
release, and I'm pretty confident that the 2.060 will contain 
more bug fixes than any past release.