Possible solution to template bloat problem?

[Ramon]

Happily I'm stupid and completely missed the condescending tone 
of an evident genius. Instead I'll just be grateful that it 
pleased one of the D masters to drop some statement down at me at 
all.

On Tuesday, 20 August 2013 at 21:52:29 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu 
wrote:
> On 8/20/13 2:22 PM, Ramon wrote:
>> = vs :=
> 
> void main() {
>     int a, b;
>     if (a = b) {}
> }
>
> ./test.d(4): Error: assignment cannot be used as a condition, 
> perhaps == was meant?
>
> This is a solved problem. (However see also 
> http://d.puremagic.com/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=10862 which I 
> just submitted). I haven't heard a peep about it in D and C++ 
> circles (most C++ compilers define a similar warning, although 
> they aren't required).

I did as advised and found:

> Now consider:
> 
> void main() {
>     int a, b;
>     if ((a = b) = 0) {}
> }
> 
> This compiles diagnostic-free. The shape if (expr1 = expr2) 
> should be
> disallowed at a grammatical level, i.e. during parsing

Oops.
So, after all, making it invitingly easy to mix up assignment and 
comparison can actually be troublesome? Wow.

>> I've seen hints from the authors of D themselves that '++' and 
>> '--'
>> might not be the wisest way of action. So I stand here asking 
>> "Why the
>> hell did they implement them?"
>
> That would be news to me. I find "++" and "--" very useful for 
> daily use. D also implements their overloading arguably in a 
> more elegant way than C++ does.

I don't remember the precise spot but somewhere (here on this 
site) someone from the D team says something to the effect of 
maybe pre *and* post inc/dec might be not so desirable.

Whatever, it was *my* error to express myself not precisely. Yes, 
++ and -- *are* useful. What I meant (and didn't make clear) was 
that there are 2 versions, post and pre. One of them is fine, two 
versions, pre and post, can create trouble.

>> It would be very simple to implement that logic in an editor 
>> for those
>> who feel that life without '++' is impossible to automagically 
>> expand
>> "x++" to "X := x + 1".
>
> This argument is unlikely to do very well with this crowd.

So do other arguments in a C++ crowd. Happily enough you did 
think what you thought and what made you aork on D anyway.

>> Having seen corporations in serious trouble
>> because their system broke (or happily continued to run albeit 
>> producing
>> erroneous data ...) for this "small detail" I have a hard time 
>> to defend
>> '++'. ("Save 5 sec typing/day and risk your company!").
>
> Very interesting! What pernicious effects does "++" have?

Same thing as above. Pre-inc'ing e.g. a pointer that should be 
post-inc'ed can lead to pretty ugly situations.

>> Another issue (from an Ada background): Why "byte" ... (the 
>> complete
>> series up to) ... "cent"? Bytes happen to be important for 
>> CPUs - not
>> for the world out there. I wouldn't like to count the 
>> gazillion cases
>> where code went belly up because something didn't fit in 16 
>> bits. Why
>> not the other way around, why not the whole she-bang, i.e., 4 
>> (or) 8
>> bytes as default for a single fixed point type ("int") and a 
>> mechanism
>> to specify what actually is needed?
>> So for days in a month we'd have "int'b5 dpm;" (2 pow x 
>> notation) or
>> "int'32dpm;"?
>
> As a rule of thumb primitive types model primitive machine 
> types. For everything else there are libraries. Or should be 
> :o).
>
>> This happens to be a nice example for perspective. C's 
>> perspective (by
>> necessity) was resource oriented along the line "offer an 8bit 
>> int so as
>> to not waste 16bits were 8bits suffice".
>> Yet we still do that in the 21st century rather than acting 
>> more *human
>> oriented* by putting the decision for the size to the human. 
>> Don't
>> underestimate that! The mere action of reflecting how much 
>> storage is
>> needed is valuable and helps to avoid errors.
>
> There's very much wrong in this. Byte-level access is necessary 
> in a systems language for a variety of reasons, of which 
> storing individual integers is probably the least interesting.

There is a reason or explanation for everything, no matter what.

But my point was another one. It was about another perspective. 
C's and, so it seems, D's perspective is "What's natural with a 
CPU" - mine is "What's natural and useful for humans trying to 
solve problems".

With all respect, Andrei, your argument doesn't mean too much to 
me anyway because if the job at hand is pure system low level 
programming, I'll do it in C anyway. Furthermore it is well 
understood nowadays that it might be smart to split even OS 
design into a HAL (C/Asm) and higher level stuff (higher level 
language).
Does it hurt performance to do everything in 32 bits rather than 
in, say, 16 bits (on a 32 or 64 bit CPU)? Last time I looked at 
CPU specs, no.

Finally, yes, some system level programming needs byte pointers. 
Well, how difficult or expensive could it be to implement a byte 
pointer? I think it's in the well feasible range.

But again, my argument wasn't about system programming, which, of 
course, is the perfect argument for D. OTOH: Is D really and only 
meant for systems programming? Hardly.

> Deprecating "=" in favor of ":=" would solve a problem that 
> doesn't exist, and would create a whole new one.

It *does* exist. Unless of, course, you are not content to 
consider and treat myself as a lowly moron but the creators of 
Pascal, Ada, Eiffel, and others, as well (and btw yourself, too. 
Have a look at the link you provided above ...)

And, just for completeness sake: May I ask *what* new problems 
':=' would create? Other than adding a single char in the parser, 
that is.

>
>> I wish, D had done all the miraculos things it did - and then 
>> on top,
>> had allowed itself the luxury to be more human centric rather 
>> than
>> sticking to a paradigm that was necessary 50 years ago (and 
>> even then
>> not good but necessary)
>
> I understand we all have our preferences, but reifying them to 
> absolutes is specious. If you said "Yo dudes, I don't dig '=' 
> for assignments and '++' and '--' for {inc,dec}rement. Also I 
> don't give a rat's tail on dem fixed small integers. Other that 
> dat, y'all boys did a rad job. Peace." - well that would have 
> been easier to empathize with.

Oh master, now that the man, to whom I would have referred as 
"Huh? Andrei WHO??" 2 weeks ago, has told me, I understand that 
it can't be tolerated to havea prsonal style of thinking and 
putting things. Can I be forgiven, if I pray 10 Ave Maria and 
clean your shoes with my worthless lips?

Just btw: I don't care rat sh*t whether you empathize with me or 
like me.

>> BTW: I write this because D means a lot to me not to bash it. 
>> For Java,
>> to bname an ugly excample, I never wasted a single line of 
>> criticism;
>> t'sjust not worth it. So, please, read what I say as being 
>> written in a
>> warm tone and not negatively minded.
>
> Awesome, thank you and keep destroying.

"destroying"??? Which part of "not to bash it" and of "D means a 
lot to me" and of "D is, no doubts, an excellent and modern 
incarnation of C/C++. As
far as I'm concerned D is *the* best C/C++ incarnation ever,
hands down." was too complicated to understand for your genius 
brain?

Just in case you are able to be professional on a human level for 
a moment: I want to buy your book and did look for it. It seems 
though that it's not easily available in Germany (amazon.de). 
Would you happen to have a hint for me where I can get it over 
here? Thanks.