D is dead (was: Dicebot on leaving D: It is anarchy driven development in all its glory.)

[Laeeth Isharc]

On Monday, 3 September 2018 at 16:07:21 UTC, RhyS wrote:
> On Monday, 3 September 2018 at 15:41:48 UTC, Laurent Tréguier 
> wrote:
>> Yes. It almost sounds like a smooth experience would be a bad 
>> thing to have, especially with the classic "you don't need an 
>> IDE anyway" speech. Editing experience seems often dismissed 
>> as unimportant, when it's one of the first things new users 
>> will come across when trying out D. First impressions can 
>> matter a lot.

I didn't give a you don't need an IDE speech, and I didn't say a 
smooth experience was a bad thing.

But in my experience a strong reality orientation leads to good 
things coming out of life and telling the universe it should be 
something different from what it is is a recipe for misery and 
suffering, and why would you do that to yourself?

So if you want the world to be different, come up with a plan.  
It could be I am going to donate X dollars a month to the 
Foundation to fund IDE development, or if could be figuring out 
how you can help with the work in whatever way.  But just 
grumbling - I really think that mistakes the nature of the 
situation, and not to mention human psychology.  You can 
accomplish things with a vision that's thought through and 
inspires others.  Negativity is part of being creative but not if 
you stop there.


> Its the same issue why Linux as a Desktop has been stuck with 
> almost no growth. Its easy to break things ( nvidia graphical 
> driver *lol* ), too much is so focused on the Cli that people 
> who do have a issue and are not system users quick run into a 
> flooding swamp.
>
> Too much resources split among too many distributions, 
> graphical desktops etc. Choice is good but too much choice 
> means projects are starved for resources, comparability are 
> issues, bugs are even more present, ...

Chrome books and Android seem to be doing okay.  I run Linux on 
the desktop and have done full-time since 2014.  Maybe you're 
right that it's not for everyone at this point.  And so ?  There 
just wasn't a path for people to put effort into making it 
utterly easy for non technical people beyond a certain point.  
Does that mean Linux or Linux on the desktop has failed?  I don't 
think so.  It's just not for everyone.
It's interesting to see Microsoft making it possible to run Linux 
on Windows - turns out a minority audience can be an important 
audience.

> A good example being the resources going into DMD, LDC, GDC... 
> 3 Compilers for one language, when even well funded languages 
> stick to one compiler. And now some people think its a good 
> idea to have DMD also cross compile because "its not hard to 
> do". No, maybe not but who will do all the testing, what 
> resources are going to spend when things do not work for some 
> users ( and the negative impact on their experience )... Its a 
> long list but people do not look past this. It sounds like fun, 
> lets think / or do it.

What resources do you think go into GDC?  I think Iain would love 
to hear about all these resources because I am not sure he has 
been made aware of them because they don't exist beyond him and 
possibly a tiny number of others helping in part at certain 
stages.

> Its just so frustrating that a lot of people here do not 
> understand. Most programmers are not open-source developers, 
> they are not coding gods, they are simply people who want 
> things to good smooth. Install compiler, install good supported 
> graphical IDE ( and no, VIM does not count! ), read up some 
> simple documentation and off we go... We are not looking to be 
> bug testers, core code implementer's, etc...

Sure, and probably most people would be better off at this point 
using a language that makes getting started easy.  One doesn't 
need to appeal to most people to succeed.  That's just a 
pragmatic statement of the obvious.  In time it will change but j 
don't see how recognising your observation could rationally lead 
anyone to do something differently from what they would have done 
before.

To change the world you need a goal and a first cut at a plan for 
getting there. Whether the goal is entirely realistic is much 
less important than having a plan to begin.  And I speak from 
experience here having at certain points not much more than that.


> Selfish, ... sure ... but this is how D gain more people. The 
> more people work with your language, the more potential people 
> you have that slowly are interested in helping out.

I disagree.  At this point the way for D to appeal to more people 
is to increase its appeal just a bit more to those who are 
already on the cusp of using D or would be if they had looked 
into it and to those who  use D already in some way but could use 
it more. The way for D to appeal to more people is not to address 
the complaints of those who spend more time writing on the forum 
grumbling but don't use it much, because in my experience you do 
much better appealing to the people who are your best customers 
than to those who tell you if only you could do X there would be 
huge demand.  I think that has been Walter's experience too.

Like I say, the advantage of being the underdog is that you don't 
need to appeal to everyone to continue to grow.

> But when D puts the carrot in front of the cart instead of the 
> mule. Then do not be so surprised that a lot of people find D 
> extreme frustrating and have a love-hate relationship with it.

Sure.  That's not surprising.  It's surprising that people think 
by complaining rather than taking action they will achieve much 
of a change in the world.  But with human nature it has always 
been thus, I suppose.