First experience with std.algorithm: I had to resort to writinga

[Jonathan M Davis]

Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:

> On 06/08/2010 06:59 AM, bearophile wrote:
>> Bernard Helyer:
>>> bool contains(T)(const(T)[] l, T a)
>>> {
>>>        foreach(e; l) {
>>>            if (a == e) {
>>>               return true;
>>>            }
>>>        }
>>>        return false;
>>> }
>>
>> See also:
>> http://d.puremagic.com/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=3923
> 
> That issue stems from the fact that find is quite flexible. I agree it
> has lost modularity in the process. I'll work on restoring its modularity.
> 
> Andrei

The biggest issue is the documentation rather than the function, I think. If 
find() can be broken up, that could help, but the main issue is what the 
documentation looks like. It's just too complicated - especially the 
function signature. Pretty much the only sane way to figure the 
std.algorithm functions out is to focus on the examples (which while good 
are still fairly sparse). As it stands, I expect the documentation to scare 
away potential users of std.algorithm. It looks far scarier than it actually 
is. We need to find a way or ways to make the documentation simple like the 
functions are simple to use (since, for the most part they're pretty easy to 
use in spite of their nasty signatures).

As for a contains() function, I would argue that it would be nice to add one 
regardless of the state of find(). Not only would it would make its usage 
clearer in the use case where you're checking whether a range contains a 
value, but it could almost certainly be better optimized for such a use case 
- if nothing else because it wouldn't have to construct a range, just return 
a bool.

- Jonathan M Davis