Why is D unpopular?

[Bruce Carneal]

On Friday, 29 April 2022 at 04:09:40 UTC, Araq wrote:
> On Friday, 29 April 2022 at 01:33:36 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>> On 11/2/2021 11:48 AM, Paulo Pinto wrote:
...
>> Um, Zortech C++ was the first native C++ compiler on DOS in 
>> 1987. (The existing ones were all cfront based, and were 
>> terribly slow.)
>
> From D&E:
>
> "The size of this overhead depends critically on the time 
> needed to read and write the intermediate C representation and 
> that primarily depends on the disc read/write strat- egy of a 
> system. Over the years I have measured this overhead on various 
> systems and found it to be between 25% and 100% of the 
> "necessary" parts of a compilation. I have also seen C++ 
> compilers that didn't use intermediate C yet were slower than 
> Cfront plus a C compiler."
>
> That's not "terribly slow". And before you bring up "templates 
> are slow to compile", in 1987 cfront did not have templates.

Is there evidence that Zortech C++ was one of the "various 
systems" mentioned in your quote?  Is it known that "necessary 
parts of a compilation" were implemented to run at competitive 
speed? (as opposed to, say, 4X slower than your best effort)

...

>>
>> No, you won't find this account in the D&E of C++ histories, 
>> but it's what actually happened.
>
> Well that's the history as you remember it and Stroustrup does 
> list "1st Zortech C++ release" in June 1988. I cannot say if 
> your "90%" figure is correct or not.

Is your intent here to make clear that you have no access to hard 
data or that you don't believe Walter?  Both?  Other?