Could D have fit Microsoft's needs?

[Laeeth Isharc]

On Friday, 19 July 2019 at 13:20:00 UTC, matheus wrote:
> On Friday, 19 July 2019 at 12:59:40 UTC, user1234 wrote:
>> On Friday, 19 July 2019 at 12:24:10 UTC, matheus wrote:
>>> On Thursday, 18 July 2019 at 23:00:03 UTC, bauss wrote:
>>>> ...
>>>> Could D (Most likely as betterC) have fit into that domain 
>>>> OR is it not yet safe?
>>>
>>> Question: Have anyone from Dlang PR team tried to send Ryan 
>>> Levick (Principal Cloud Developer Advocate) or Sebastian 
>>> Fernandez (Security Software Engineer) an e-mail to talk 
>>> about D?
>>>
>>> I mean maybe "our" language is over their radar (Or not), but 
>>> this could may increase the chances or at least give them a 
>>> thought.
>>>
>>> I pretty sure that should be nice or maybe engage some sort a 
>>> relationship in the future.
>>>
>>> Matheus.
>>
>> They'd never take a language that they don't dominate / 
>> create. If something new emerge this will come from their labs 
>> / experimental languages. Before .Net the situation was 
>> similar, i.e they could have chosen something like Delphi but 
>> created .Net in response.
>>
>> To the best what could happen is that they borrow D features 
>> and everyone here then would get mad because of that...
>
> I'm not saying they would jump the ship right the way or use as 
> it is.
>
> But they are changing, just take a look over Microsoft 
> embracing Chromium or adding Linux support on Windows.
>
> And since they're even mentioning Rust, I think they may be 
> open to D.
>
> Matheus.

I suppose it's a big company and there are lots of teams within 
and then individual choices could play a part.  Microsoft already 
used D ages back for something reasonably important but funnily 
enough they didn't send out a press release announcing the fact.

If you look at some of the changes that have accompanied large 
publicly-listed corporations becoming involved in open source and 
some of the changes in values associated with that then it's 
quite an interesting question as to how the long run influence 
might be seen.  I did not think I would live to see the day when 
somebody who has written a manifesto against meritocracy would 
have an important influence on the values on which some open 
source communities are based, but it's a funny world.

I would just suggest that some kinds of alliance can be a mixed 
blessing and be careful of what you wish for.

It's definitely worth contacting individuals at Microsoft though.