Why is D unpopular?

[Max Samukha]

On Tuesday, 3 May 2022 at 19:01:44 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:

>
> I'm surprised C# can't do CTFE. I guess its creators never 
> thought of it :-)

Nemerle creators did (obviously inspired by LISPs and MLs).

>
> Java can create and compile code at runtime. I ran into this 
> when creating a Java native compiler for Symantec. It was used 
> very rarely, but just enough to sink the notion of a native 
> compiler.

The important part is that Nemerle can execute functions at 
compile time - whether it's done via interpretation or 
compilation is not relevant to the argument. D could as well 
compile CTFE into native code or IL (as in newCTFE) from the 
start.

Also, one could argue that native code is not native code, 
because it is further translated by the CPU into microcode, hence 
the CPU is an interpreter, hence any native compiler is not 
native. We'd rather accept that IL is native code to the VM and 
move on.