Is there any reason why arithmetic operation on shorts and bytes return int?

[Jonathan M Davis]

On Wednesday, December 12, 2012 10:42:31 Simen Kjaeraas wrote:
> Really? This certainly does not compile for me:
> 
> 
> struct bbyte {
> byte b;
> alias b this;
> }
> 
> void bar(bbyte b) {}
> 
> bbyte baz() {
> byte b;
> return b; // cannot implicitly convert expression (b) of type byte to
> bbyte
> }
> 
> void main() {
> byte b;
> bar(b); // function bar (bbyte b) is not callable using argument types
> (byte)
> }
> 
> 
> This is also the reason for bug #8570
> 
> http://d.puremagic.com/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=8570

If alias this isn't do an implict conversion, then there's a bug in alias 
this. That's how implict conversion is done in D, and it's the whole point
of alias this.

- Jonathan M Davis