Why do C++ programmers are not interested in D?

[Laeeth Isharc]

On Tuesday, 19 November 2019 at 17:23:46 UTC, bachmeier wrote:
> On Tuesday, 19 November 2019 at 10:57:20 UTC, Russel Winder 
> wrote:
>> On Tue, 2019-11-19 at 09:28 +0000, bachmeier via Digitalmars-d 
>> wrote:
>>> 
>> […]
>>> Unfortunately, D is not a better C++. Most notably, it has a 
>>> GC, and much of the functionality of the standard library has 
>>> historically required using the GC. Second, it doesn't work 
>>> with legacy C++ code. That's changing, but it's a big issue.
>> […]
>>
>> That many C++ developers have an obsessive fear of the words 
>> garbage collector is clearly an issue, independent of whether 
>> GC is actually an issue for their codebases.
>
> There's a bit of a sample selection issue. Anyone open to GC 
> moved to Java long ago. These days anyone still using C++ 
> either has a good reason to fear the GC (certain real-time 
> applications) or an irrational fear of the GC. The D of today 
> would have had great success at recruiting C++ programmers 20 
> years ago, but by about 2005 or so, Java had already sucked up 
> all the potential converts.

Look at the pace at which the pool of programmers is growing.  
I'm not sure that some of the programmers I work with were even 
programming at all in 2005.  Myself, I wouldn't have picked up 
programming again if it had to be Java or C++ because life is too 
short.

I think it's a real mistake to conceive of life as being a 
zero-sum game.  In general, but particularly when the pool is 
growing.

Economic decisions are taken at the margin and the potential 
substitutes are not what one might think.  It might even be do a 
project in D or don't do it at all.

The contender can keep growing for a long time picking up new 
adoption from all kinds of different places.

Also in my experience if people keep insisting something is 
doomed and it just keeps growing it might be a bad idea to be too 
confident about that. From the very earliest days on Usenet 
people were naysaying the prospects of D.  Oh well.

The bigger challenges will come with continued adoption because 
that will change the nature of the people in the community which 
may require some adjustments.