How do you use D?

[Pjotr Prins]

On Wednesday, 3 January 2018 at 18:36:29 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad 
wrote:
> Then you have this all the psychological effect that if people 
> have invested significant time, resources and/or emotion into 
> something then they will defend it and refuse to see flaws even 
> when faced with massive evidence against it. So the hype will 
> be sustained by a vocal set of believers if you have reached  a 
> large enough audience with your messaging before the product is 
> launched…?

Aye.

> Then it tapers off in a long tail… or the believers will make 
> it work somehow, at least good enough to not be a lot worse 
> than the alternatives.

I am thinking of Python here. I have to work in Python and there 
is no love lost.

Regarding hype. I think it is fairly easy to create a new 
language these days - thanks to LLVM and JVM targets. New 
languages pop up every other week it appears. Getting it right, 
however, takes a lot of time. D proves how much it takes to 
create a great (complex) language and deal with most corner 
cases. Writing a performing compiler (run time and compile time) 
is no mean feat.

>> docs. I just disagree with the aim of trying to make D a hyped 
>> language.
>
> Yes, that is a bit late, I think. You would have to launch D3 
> or something to get a hype effect (at least in the west).

I think D is too powerful/complicated to become a target for 
millions. The irony does not escape me, with many C++/JVM 
programmers out there, that D is a great replacement for C++ and 
many JVM languages. I did a stretch of Scala and I think D is the 
superior language, even if it misses out on some nifty Scala 
features. But that does not mean people will take to D in droves. 
Scala is bigger.

Anyway, my opinions do not matter that much. Suffice to say I 
enjoy D and I think it is perfect for our large data processing 
projects.

>> A language like GNU Guile has only a few developers - and they 
>> do great work.
>
> But is Guile used much outside GNU affiliated projects?

No. Not that I am aware. Still, it is an amazing effort by a 
small group of people. I am partial to organizing a Guile/Guix 
day. Feel free to join in! 
https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Group:Guix/FOSDEM2018.

Pj.