VisualD regressions are severe; what do we do about critical infrastructure?

[Manu]

On Wed, 16 Oct 2024 at 06:26, monkyyy via Digitalmars-d <
digitalmars-d at puremagic.com> wrote:

> On Tuesday, 15 October 2024 at 16:25:37 UTC, Manu wrote:
> >
> > I've spent 15+ years trying to see D move beyond a
> > hobby/curiosity/toy, but this stuff shows we're not in good
> > shape even after such a long time :/
>
> Have you been a d-doomer long or is this new?


"Doom"? I mean, you need to be realistic, and honest. Point to the
industrial users of D; they're still the same ones as 10 years ago. I
haven't identified new ones. Almost all the people at dconf are the same
people.
I started a green-fields project in D recently; I thought this is great, it
doesn't need to bind with legacy, no C++ troubles, no awkward shim's or
build systems... my colleagues were enthusiastic about this direction, but
I had a conversation yesterday that started "are you sure this is the right
choice?"... because they have demonstrated to themselves in a very short
amount of time all the classic problems. They're not zealots; they're just
sensible and professional engineers, and trying to make sensible decisions
with respect to a business making technology commitments.

There's a certain amount of optimism that just can't sustain 16 years of
energy... and it's not like casual effort, I've spent at least 12 years
solidly working hard to get things into a workable shape. If that all goes
backward by a country mile when I look away for a hot minute; that's very
disheartening indeed.
So I guess the answer to your question is; yes, I approach D now with a
very different mood. It's changed from one of optimism to one of despair,
and I'm definitely in a last-hoorah mindset. There's some important
progress going on right now (which should have happened over a decade ago,
but I'll grant better late than never!), so that's encouraging, but
ancillary matters like extensive VisualD regressions are just something I
didn't expect, and/or have time or energy to deal with.

Threads like this are as old as the hills, and if we're not going to start
to take them seriously, then when? Maybe it's not that we're not taking
them seriously per-se, but nobody knows what to do. Rainer has been doing
god's work, but he's still just one guy, and he's doing other stuff right
now. He also has no obligation to make his time/energy available; and
of-course, you can say that about every person and every aspect of an open
source project like this, but to commit to that position is to send a clear
message that "D is not for industry". We've gotta do better than that
SOMEHOW; or else it's just as I say, this is a small community huddled
around a curiosity, a hobby; where just a couple of businesses with juuuust
the right set of contextual parameters have been able to make a sustained
commitment, but there's no broad path for growth... we've had way more than
enough time now to prove otherwise, but we haven't.
This isn't 'doom', it's just being realistic. As the champion of several
promising industrial efforts, over 3-4 companies (one with billion dollar
budgets), I still haven't been able to seal the deal. And now my own tiny
startup where I control literally everything... it still doesn't seem to be
possible to land. I guess that's on me; I'm a complete and comprehensive
failure! ...but I don't think that's entirely fair, because there's just no
comparable success stories that invalidate my experience. Find me some case
studies where a motivated individual tried to introduce D to their
organisation and were successful?

The ecosystem needs to recognise the key risk projects and strategically
direct resources to them. Look at it from the perspective of a business
considering a technology commitment; it's a time-bomb (as I've apparently
discovered at the most un-timely moment possible)... what do we do to
convince ourselves otherwise?
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