D vs Go in real life

[Chris Cain]

On Friday, 29 November 2013 at 16:15:10 UTC, Chris wrote:
> I agree that D, too, can be a bit confusing. I sometimes have 
> problems with AA declarations.
>
> Example:
>
> string[string][string] hm; // What am I?
>
> But I don't think it's the reading direction.

Actually it is. D is pretty good about being consistently read 
backwards (which, as you can tell, is a tiny bit awkward, hence 
why I think "the other way" is better).

hm is an associative array mapping string to another associative 
array mapping string to string.

Pseudocode:
hm [string][string]string;


How about something *ridiculous* in right-to-left reading:

rofl *[string][]*bool;

Try to read that before seeing what's below:

-----

rofl is a pointer to an associative array mapping strings to 
arrays of pointers to bools. Very simple and very intuitive. 
After reading a few things like that you become very comfortable 
with it.

> I wonder why you would want the variable name first.

It's really irrelevant either way, but it "reads out loud" much 
better in my experience

> For my liking Go code looks too cluttered (pointing out the 
> obvious). But I guess it's just the way you're "brought up" 
> with a language. Maybe I'm a dinosaur.

I'm not suggesting Go got it perfectly. I've seen a lot of 
languages that have cleaner declarations, IMO. To be honest, Go 
looks kind of cluttered in my eyes too. But the right-to-left 
reading order is something I'm a very strong proponent of. I'm 
fine with D, however, since you can usually reliably read it 
backwards. C, however, is a horrific mess.