More Illuminating Introductory Code Example on dlang.org

Tofu Ninja emmons0 at purdue.edu
Thu Feb 13 02:58:31 PST 2014


On Thursday, 13 February 2014 at 04:30:26 UTC, Mike Parker wrote:
> On Wednesday, 12 February 2014 at 20:49:54 UTC, Nordlöw wrote:
>>
>> I believe the first code example a newbie sees when he/she 
>> first visits dlang.org should be some variation of Walter's 
>> showcase on Component Programming including all the bells and 
>> whistles of lazy evaluted ranges.
>>
>> IMHO, this would increase the probability of the newbie 
>> staying a bit further on the site trying to figure out the 
>> details of what make this intriguing D code example tick. And, 
>> as a result, be more convinced about D's unique and powerful 
>> features.
>>
>> What do you think, fellow D programmers?
>
> I disagree. If that had been my first look at D, I would have 
> run away and never looked back. That style of code looks like a 
> foreign language to anyone who's not used to it, implying a 
> steep learning curve. Some people might be intrigued enough to 
> dig into it, but anyone looking to just get stuff done isn't 
> going to bother. Alongside an imperative-style snippet, it's 
> fine. I think it's great to show that D supports both styles. 
> I'd suggest actually showing two ways to do the same task, one 
> in imperative style and one using the range pipeline.

I have to agree with this, if the first thing I saw when I came 
here was ranges I would have left a long time ago. I think most 
people who find themselves looking at D went looking for C++ like 
language with a cleaner syntax, so I think examples that 
illustrate that would be better for a front page kind of thing.


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