@property - take it behind the woodshed and shoot it?

[mist]

On Thursday, 24 January 2013 at 22:45:52 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> Having a release process does not remove the pain of breaking 
> changes that make users miserable because their older code no 
> longer compiles.

Beg my pardon, it is very ignorant position. It assumes user is 
some kind of stubborn creature that is scared of any spec 
changes. But it is not really the case. Users are not afraid of 
compiler release breaking their code - they are afraid of not 
having a single compiler version that both is stable enough and 
works for their code. And that it is very different.

It is fine to break code in release if you still provide 
bug-fixes to some older version that may be recommended for usage 
until time to fix code base is taken. And this is exactly where 
good release process shines, it is single most important reason 
to have it.

To sum up my position:
1) D spec is imperfect
2) Breaking change are inevitable
3) Saying "breaking changes" are bad means hiding the problem
4) It is better to focus on process to minimize breaking changes 
damage than rant about how bad they are
5) Leaving feature badly designed for years with no hope to 
change is worse than breaking code.

I'd really like to read your position on _all_ of those 
statements, because we are running circles here.