Replace core language HexStrings with library entity

Andrei Alexandrescu via Digitalmars-d digitalmars-d at puremagic.com
Tue Mar 17 11:33:57 PDT 2015


On 3/17/15 10:33 AM, Artur Skawina via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On 03/17/15 15:15, Daniel Murphy via Digitalmars-d wrote:
>> "Nick Treleaven"  wrote in message news:me98hl$2erf$1 at digitalmars.com...
>>
>>> They add complexity to tools such as ctags (written in C, the fishman fork supports D but not D-specific strings).
>>
>> Yes, but only a very little bit.  How much code could you delete from a D lexer if they were removed?
>
> About 80 lines. Which can actually be a significant portion of a full lexer (~15%).
> That still does not mean that they should go; they are useful, for example for
> writing multiline embedded DSLs.
> OTOH this would be just one more random weekly language change, so why not?

Well said.

It pains me to no end to see energy going in all the wrong places. Just 
now I was reviewing some code using std.json. Most everybody admits that 
library could be improved or rewritten. There's been some work on the 
latter, which has not been pursued to completion. Until then, we've had 
for _years_ a mediocre - albeit let's say passable - implementation with 
a shockingly bad documentation - http://dlang.org/phobos/std_json.html 
has not ONE example, like literally not ONE line of code on it. It's 
been like that for YEARS. I'd find it difficult to imagine a simpler and 
more impactful way to contribute to D, than improving on that documentation.

And that has nothing to do with the quality of generating e.g. template 
constraints etc. It's simply about a good soul writing some documentation.

I wouldn't even be too bothered about it if only a handful of folks were 
working on D. But there's all this churn in the group, all this spinning 
of the wheels, all to so little outcome. Until we mobilize ourselves to 
get good work done, D doesn't deserve more notoriety than it has.


Andrei



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