Is there ANY chance we can fix the bitwise operator precedence rules?

[bearophile]

Don:

> Tragic. Can we end this madness?
> Could we give & | ^ the same precedence as ==, making
> (a & mask == b) an error, just as (a < b == c) is rejected?
> That way we could lay this common bug to rest.

You can change the dmd compiler (even D1, if you want) applying this change and create a compiled "experiment version" that people can try (even people that don't compile dmd every day), to see possible side effects of this change, use it to spot bugs in their D code or inside Phobos, etc.


> BTW I think this a great cautionary tale about the dangers of rating 
> backwards compatibility too highly.

Beside that one, there are few other parts of C/D code that I'd like still to turn into syntax errors in D2, like:

1) Implicit string concat (bug 3827, with an incomplete patch):

string[] a = ["foo", "bar" "baz"];

2) switch cases that don't end with goto or break:

void main() {
    int x, y;
    switch (x) {
        case 0: y++;
        default: y--;
    }
}


3) Several usages of C comma operator.

And few others that I don't remember now.

----------------

Andrei Alexandrescu:

> A perhaps little known thing is that D doesn't allow this:
> int a, b, c;
> if (a < b < c) { ... }
> although it's compilable code in C.

It's a pity C compatibily forbids to use that syntax in D, because chained comparison operator syntax is handy in Python to tell if a value is in a range:

>>> 1 < 5 < 10
True
>>> "hello" < "zeta" < "red"
False

Bye,
bearophile