Dealing with Autodecode

[H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d]

On Wed, Jun 01, 2016 at 12:56:03AM +0000, Stefan Koch via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On Wednesday, 1 June 2016 at 00:46:04 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> > It is not practical to just delete or deprecate autodecode - it is
> > too embedded into things.
>
> Which Things ?
>
> > The way to deal with it is to replace reliance on autodecode with
> > .byDchar (.byDchar has a bonus of not throwing an exception on invalid
> > UTF, but using the replacement dchar instead.)
> 
> > To that end, and this will be an incremental process:
> > ....
> 
> So does this mean we intend to carry the auto-decoding wart with us
> into the future. And telling everyone :
> "The oblivious way is broken we just have it for backwards
> compatibility ?"

If we can pull off what Walter proposed, it will put us one step closer
to killing autodecode for good. Killing autodecode today is very drastic
and unwise to do in one fell swoop. I see .byDchar as a first step.

First it's introduced as an optional feature so that people can start
using it. We promote its usage everywhere.

Then we make it a deprecation to *not* use it, perhaps with a migration
compiler switch so that people are not forced to migrate immediately,
but they are warned beforehand.

After enough time elapses, the compiler switch becomes the default, with
an option to disable it if the user so chooses.

Then after another while the switch is removed and using .byDchar
becomes required.

Finally, autodecoding is relegated to the dustbin of history and there
will be much rejoicing. :-P  I will personally savor every moment of
pressing the delete-line command in my editor while making the PR to
finally kill off the last of the autodecoding code.


T

-- 
Famous last words: I *think* this will work...