accept @pure @nothrow @return attributes

[Mike via Digitalmars-d]

On Monday, 26 January 2015 at 19:51:08 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 1/26/2015 3:39 AM, Jonathan M Davis via Digitalmars-d wrote:
>> Personally, I'd much prefer that we not make this change.
>
> It's good to have this discussion.
>
> Previously, it's all been advocacy and "break my code" by 
> forcing a change from pure => @pure.

Yes, please! (at least about the "break my code" part)

>
> Just a few days ago on slashdot, an anonymous D user wrote:
>
>   "A horrible mix of keywords and annotation syntax for 
> function/method
>   attributes ('const', 'pure', and 'nothrow' are all keywords, 
> but
>   '@property', and '@nogc' are annotations)"
>
> for why he won't use D anymore.

Not a deal-breaker for me, but I agree with the sentiment, and I 
think it makes for a more professional language if such 
inconsistencies are addressed.

>
> Frankly, I think that is a great bikeshedding non-issue that 
> distracts us from what is important.

Yes, there is no correlation between what's important, and what 
people choose to work on, because there is no consensus on what's 
important, and if there is it's usually beyond the ability of 
most contributors, so it doesn't get worked on anyway.  
Personally, I find small changes like this welcome because they 
make for a more polished experience.

> I hope that by doing this PR, we can actually decide that it 
> isn't worth it, i.e. I'd be happy to get consensus and revert 
> it.

A dangerous precedent.  I suspect the push-back against this 
change has probably ruined any chance of further polishing the 
language.

From: https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=13388#c27
***
>> I really think that we've passed the point where it's worth 
>> fixing it.

NO!!!! This attitude is the biggest problem D has.
Please, watch Scott Meyer's talk again. "Most D code is yet to be 
written".
The future benefits of fixing this kind of crap, are huge.
***

In fact, it is the attitude against change that has put me on the 
fence about D, when I was quite an advocate about a year ago.  It 
has also made me reluctant to put forth the necessary effort to 
study and make any significant contributions because the 
controversy, as exhibited here, would likely erase my entire 
investment.  Instead, I have begun exploring other options while 
keeping one foot on the raft.

I agree that, in general, D should take a more disciplined 
approach to development, but keep in mind that if contributors 
have to go through too much controversy and bureaucracy we're not 
going to see much change (perhaps that's what some want).

I feel for Walter.  He's damned if he does and damned if he 
doesn't.  Somehow, this herd of cats need to figure out where it 
wants to go, and I need to figure out whether to go all in or 
jump ship.

Mike