How usable is the D language without a garbage collector?

[Ola Fosheim Grøstad]

On Saturday, 16 July 2022 at 22:23:36 UTC, welkam wrote:
> It was said before but I will repeat it. Try not to view D as 
> C++ with its flaws fixed but as C with features added to it. If 
> you would to expect D to behave like C++ you will get 
> frustrated as D doesnt behave like C++ in some cases.

Well, C++ has been distancing itself from C for a long time and 
new features makes this more and more true for modern C++.

C is a legacy language that is in for the long haul, but trying 
to merge higher level concepts with C leads to unnecessary 
complications. There are some decisions in D that undermines what 
C tries to achieve, like having wrapping signed int, having non 
zero default initialization  for built in types and GC dependent 
language features.

In total, C++ is more of a C with features added, making C 
constructs and idioms more and more obsolete. Making C++ 
increasingly more high level.

D is more like an attempt to merge C, Java and templates, but 
trying to find a path back to C patterns while retaining some 
memory safety rather than providing abstractions of a higher 
level to deal with in optimization. It is unclear whether there 
is a market for C idioms. It might be waning...