TLBB: The Last Big Breakage

[Andrea]

I'm a newcomer to D so I may not be aware of many things that are 
going on in this community. If by any change I write anything 
stupid let me know. Also this may not be the right thread to post 
this and I'm sorry for that. That being said...

I'm seeing a lot a major breaking changes being discussed here on 
the forums and the proposal of a possible D3. As Walter and 
Andrei noted in another thread, I don't think D can take that 
hit. From my understanding, D is starting to get back on his feet 
after the D1->D2 transition *now*. Another major transition would 
mean killing it.

I propose an OpenGL-like route to deprecation through the use of 
profiles. DMD could implement a default core profile and an 
optional compatibility profile (adding/replacing in the core 
profile the otherwise broken features) to be activated with a 
flag. In a few years time the compatibility profile would be 
deprecated and DMD would enforce the new "best practices". In the 
short term the current "broken" code will still work without 
having to be rewritten.