D as A Better C?

[Walter Bright]

On 2/11/2014 1:00 PM, Brian Rogoff wrote:
> Which D metaprogramming (templates, mixins, ctfe, ..) features would be in this
> D subset?

All of them.


> Would the non-gc'ed functional programming features (downward funargs) be in the
> subset?

All of them.


> If the answers are "all and yes" I'd be very interested, if "none and no" then
> much less interested. Please say more about which features you expect to make
> the cut.

Associative arrays would not, as they rely on the GC.

It would require support for COMDATs from the linker, while C does not. 
Fortunately, C++ adoption has pretty much driven COMDAT support into all the 
linkers that matter.


> D-lite, while already used, is the natural name choiec.

Cute names are amusing for a few seconds, but they get old real fast.


> As others point out, there's some risk of fragmentation, but there's precedent
> even in unsubsettable languages like Ada (SPARK) so I don't think the risk is so
> great.

There's also precedent in C itself, as the C Standard codifies the notion of a 
"freestanding" implementation of C, although that's not quite what we're talking 
about here. Freestanding means no C runtime library, either.