assert semantic change proposal

[Araq via Digitalmars-d]

> Furthermore, I think Walter's idea to use asserts as a source of
> optimizer hints is a very powerful concept that may turn out to 
> be a
> revolutionary feature in D. It could very well develop into the 
> answer
> to my long search for a way of declaring identities in 
> user-defined
> types that allow high-level optimizations by the optimizer, thus
> allowing user-defined types to be on par with built-in types in
> optimizability.

The answer to your search is "term rewriting macros (with 
sideeffect and alias analysis)" as introduced by Nimrod. Watch my 
talk. ;-)

'assume' is not nearly powerful enough for this and in no way 
"revolutionary".