float init 0 request

[Valentino Giudice]

On Friday, 14 August 2026 at 05:57:55 UTC, ABrightLight wrote:
> Hello. I understand this subject's been discussed a number of 
> times before, but I'd like to throw in my reasoning for why it 
> would benefit us more for floats to initialize to 0 than NaN.

I second the request for initializing floats to 0.

Simply being able to declare array or variables wouldn't require 
the standard to guarantee any default value for anything.

In fact, it is possible, in D, to declare an array without 
initializing it. This could be the default, but it isn't, meaning 
the user can rely on arrays initialized by default. This isn't my 
style, but it is allowed by the language and it is justified by 
the fact that it is possible to create an array which is 
initialized by default or not.

All other types are initialized to the most useful values. For 
integers that is usually 0. For pointers and references that is 
clearly null. There is no valid pointer that could be used and 
null is the only invalid pointer that can be checked for and it 
safely indicates that no object is being referenced.

Because null is 0, arrays can be trivially initialized with a 
calloc at a lower level.

I don't see why all other types are initialized to the most 
useful value, but floats are initialized to the most useless one.

If the goal were to force users to initialize everything 
manually, than no default initialization should be guaranteed at 
all, but it is. Void initialization and uninitializedArray 
wouldn't exist, as they would simply represent the default 
behavior.