Daily downloads in decline

[Tofu Ninja via Digitalmars-d]

On Friday, 12 June 2015 at 17:58:22 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu 
wrote:
> On 6/12/15 10:26 AM, deadalnix wrote:
>>
>> This baffles me. It seems that language designer always need 
>> to fuck up
>> macros either by:
>>  - Creating a new API to spawn AST, which become a burden on 
>> the
>> compiler development (bonus point if you expose compiler 
>> internal).
>>  - Creating a new syntax, preferably completely inscrutable so 
>> you can
>> pretend you are a guru while using it.
>>
>> There is a good way to express AST in a language, and this is 
>> how you do
>> it for everything else in the program : you use the damn 
>> language syntax
>> and grammar.
>
> In their defense, there is a need for a metalanguage as well do 
> manipulate ASTs themselves. That's why all macro systems just 
> look a bit off. I suggest you give it a shot at defining a 
> natural-looking macro system if you're up to something, but I 
> suspect there are many subtleties to cope with.
>
> Andrei

Good timing. Check the thread I made about statement mixins, it 
hase a pretty natural and simple macro syntax that is an 
extension of the mixin syntax. Thorough admitadly no way to 
manipulate ast.