Semantics of toString

[Justin Johansson]

Don Wrote:

> Lutger wrote:
> > Don wrote:
> > ...
> >> There is a definite use for such as thing. But the existing toString()
> >> is much, much worse than useless. People think you can do something with
> >> it, but you can't.
> >> eg, people have asked for BigInt to support toString(). That is an
> >> over-my-dead-body.
> > 
> > Since you are in the know and probably the biggest toString() hater around: 
> > are there plans (or rejections thereof) to change toString() before D2 turns 
> > gold? Seems to me it could break quite some code.
> 
> 
> I'm hoping someone will come up with a design.
> 
> Straw man:
> 
> void toString(void delegate(const(char)[]) sink, string fmt) {
> 
> // fmt holds the format string from writefln/formatln.
> // call sink() to print partial results.
> 
> }

That's starting to look like a "serialize" method!