Current state of "D as a better C" (Windows)?

[Frank Bauer]

On Saturday, 25 January 2014 at 23:01:12 UTC, Jakob Ovrum wrote:
> Setting aside syntax, it's extremely trivial to implement 
> C++-style new/delete as function templates.

Fine. Can I use it with Phobos?

> Array functionality *that C and C++ do not have*. D slices are 
> plenty useful without the primitives that allocate, such as 
> concatenation.

I love D's slices. Super elegant. Can't imagine how one could 
ever invent half slices, i.e. array pointers without length ;)

> This very thread is an example of how you're not forced to use 
> a runtime that implements these primitives.

We must be in two different threads:

On Wednesday, 22 January 2014 at 02:18:43 UTC, Vladimir Panteleev 
wrote:
> - A "standard library" which does not require runtime support, 
> but can also be used when using Druntime (as a GC-free 
> alternative to Phobos)

On Wednesday, 22 January 2014 at 04:13:41 UTC, Mike wrote:
> Phobos will not be useful to me unless I can find some way to 
> make it lighter and GC-Free. ... I would _really_ like to have 
> the
> whole concept of a GC decoupled from D. There are many suitable 
> memory models to use with D, and the memory model seems like it 
> should be a platform feature, not a language feature.

I understand from this thread that we are at a GC-free Hello 
World at this point. Well ...

> The GC is a library implementation with language hooks.

No it is not. It is part of the language. Every allocation 
*inside* the language (i.e. with new) goes through the GC.

> There aren't that many language features that depend on a GC, 
> and the ones that do can be disabled with a custom runtime.

I don't want to miss out on a single language feature of D. Where 
is that GC-free runtime?

> druntime/Phobos are designed for a mixed allocation strategy, 
> where tracing GC is one of the strategies used. Many Phobos 
> types and functions do not rely on a GC.

In theory (which gives me hope), not in practice. Where is that 
GC-free Phobos?

> Java and C# do not function well without GC at all 
> (disregarding the effort you'd have to go through to get a Java 
> or C# implementation without GC).
>
> D definitely *does*.

Again, this gives me hope. Please Walter, Andrei: search all the 
forums for "I want D with opt-in GC" (fuzzy search, that is) and 
count matches.