ImportC shows the way to D3?

[claptrap]

On Monday, 20 June 2022 at 08:46:25 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad 
wrote:

> Compiling to the same AST does not allow you to change 
> semantics without ending up with more complex compiler 
> internals. So you are limited to smaller semantic adjustments 
> and syntax.
>
> I've suggested somewhere else that if DMD implemented a high 
> level IR between frontend and backend then you could compile D2 
> and D3 to the same high level IR.
>
> But you still have to replicate templates in both your D2 and 
> D3 code bases as you don't want to do D-style meta programming 
> in the high level IR that sits before the backend. You also 
> cannot just combine D3 with D2 templates when D2 is capable of 
> introspection.
>
> If fixing bugs and completing the semantics of D2 is time 
> consuming, why would you make it even more difficult to achieve 
> by merging D3 into the D2 frontend? Yes, this also applies to 
> "import C". It was done at the wrong time. The internals should 
> have been redesigned first to handle it gracefully.

Well if that's the case an experimental branch where the 
internals are redesigned, and if/when that's successful you work 
on D3, but you'd keep the current vanilla D2 branch as the main 
compiler until such time as the experimental/D3 one is ready for 
prime time.