What's the deal with "Warning: explicit element-wise assignment..."

[Wyatt via Digitalmars-d]

On Wednesday, 30 April 2014 at 16:48:50 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad 
wrote:
> On Wednesday, 30 April 2014 at 15:45:32 UTC, Andrei 
> Alexandrescu wrote:
>>> The name should indicate what you get (the calculating of a 
>>> result), not
>>> how the framework obtains it (sequential scan).
>>
>> Making complexity an implementation detail is an antipattern. 
>> -- Andrei
>
> Where did I say that?

I think the thrust of the statement is this: by shoving under the 
rug the method by which the length is obtained, it also conceals 
the algorithmic complexity and hinders good judgement on what 
tradeoffs are being made.

I can see the argument for either position, really.  Personally, 
I think "calculate" sufficiently denotes that there's nontrivial 
work going into the process, but "walk" makes it fairly clear 
that O(n) should be expected.

It's an awkward discussion because neither is very discoverable 
in the first place; maybe make one an alias for the other and 
give people a sporting chance to find the damn thing?

-Wyatt