D2.x writef et al and template bloat

[BCS]

Reply to Walter,

> Bill Baxter wrote:
> 
>> It seems like writef and many other functions got changed to vararg
>> templates in D2.x.
>> 
> Yes. That makes them run much faster. Instead of interpreting the
> format at runtime, each format gets custom code.
> 
>> Doesn't this mean there will be a different instantiation of the
>> writef template for every combination of arguments used to call it?
>> 
> Yes - but I'll correct that for every *type* combination of arguments.
> 
>> Sounds like it could lead to a lot of template bloat in D
>> executables.  Is it a non-issue for some reason?
>> 
> The linker will remove duplicates. However, I think even in a large
> program, there won't be that many combinations. It also has the
> potential to *reduce* code bloat in small programs, as the unused
> formatting code won't be there.
> 

If you want to known how many cases there are you can add a pragma(msg, formatTypeTupleTemplateWidgit!(args)) 
to wrightf and then filter the output for unique lines.