Phobos - breaking existing code

[Jonathan M Davis via Digitalmars-d]

On Monday, December 01, 2014 09:57:33 bearophile via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> Walter Bright:
>
> > Thanks! I like pressing existing features into use over
> > inventing new ones :-)
>
> The existing feature to be used is @deprecated, it's more
> self-documenting and it was designed for that purpose. Using that
> special assert is just a workaround. No one was suggesting to
> invent new feature, but to add a string argument to the right
> feature to use.

The primary difference is that deprecated symbols are still usable, whereas
a disabled wouldn't be - nor would a function with static assert(0) in it be
usable. And if a something in Phobos is usuable, then we need to maintain
it, and that's a problem if we're trying to get rid of it. A function that
results in a static assertion when used is still a problem, because it does
leave cruft in the library, and it creates symbol conflicts with any symbols
which happen to use the same name, but it's still better than leaving
something as deprecated permanently.

- Jonathan M Davis