Bug? aliasing member of instance

[Steven Schveighoffer]

On Sat, 22 Oct 2011 03:28:53 -0400, Nick Sabalausky <a at a.a> wrote:

> Is this a compiler bug?
>
> --------------------------------
> struct Foo
> {
>     int a;
> }
>
> Foo foo;
> alias foo.a b;
>
> void main()
> {
>     b = 5;  // <-- Error
> }
> --------------------------------
>
>> dmd test.d
> test.d(11): Error: need 'this' to access member a
>
> I did this on DMD 2.055

alias works on *symbols* not data.

For example, if Foo has a function bar(), aliasing foo.bar is equivalent  
to aliasing Foo.bar.  You are aliasing the *function* not the *delegate*.

So naturally, it would make sense that aliasing foo.a is equivalent to  
aliasing Foo.a, or the symbol that accesses the member 'a' in an instance  
of 'Foo'.

I would expect this may work:

void main()
{
    foo.b = 5;
}

-Steve