Writing/Creating files at compile-time

[via Digitalmars-d]

On Monday, 10 August 2015 at 08:03:47 UTC, lobo wrote:
> While I agree with you I am curious; where would the compiler 
> place its artefacts and why can't "export" write to the same 
> place?

I think that is an implementation detail and not a language-issue.

> The way I see it files created by export would be transient 
> anyway, generated each time you compile.

Yes, or cached, but it should not be a file. You might want the 
ability to build resources (e.g. for Apple ios/osx bundles), but 
then you would need compiler support for those resource bundles. 
E.g. create a bundle as a "database" and then populate it 
programatically.

If you go down the route of generating files you probably also 
would also need to build in "make" like dependency resolution so 
that the resources are built in the correct order...

Another point: if "export" is needed to generate D-files then one 
would be better off adding AST-macros instead and generate the 
AST for whole modules in-memory. Saving the AST to disk for 
inspection would be a compiler-pragma.