std.file.read returns void[] why?

[Regan Heath]

On Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:36:20 +0100, Spacen Jasset  
<spacenjasset at mailrazer.com> wrote:

> Why does the read function return void[] and not byte[]
>
> void[] read(in char[] name, size_t upTo = size_t.max);

One one hand the data is always /actually/ going to be a load of (u)bytes,  
but /conceptually/ it might be structs or something else and using void[]  
therefore doesn't /imply/ anything about what the data really is.

I also thought that void[] was implicitly cast.. but it seems this either  
has never been the case or was changed at some point:

import std.stdio;

void main(string[] args)
{
	byte[] barr = new byte[10];
	foreach(i, ref b; barr)
		b = cast(byte)('a' + i);
	
	void[] varr = barr;
	char[] carr;
	
	//carr = barr; // Error: cannot implicitly convert expression (barr) of  
type byte[] to char[]
	carr = cast(char[])barr;
	
	//carr = varr; // Error: cannot implicitly convert expression (varr) of  
type void[] to char[]
	carr = cast(char[])varr;
	
	writefln("%d,%s", carr.length, carr);
}

I am curious, was it ever possible, was it changed?  why?  It's always  
"safe" - as the compiler knows how much data the void[] contains, and  
void[] is "untyped" so it sorta makes sense to allow it..

R

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