C is Brittle D is Plastic

[Walter Bright]

On 3/22/2026 10:19 AM, Derek Fawcus wrote:
> One can even play macro games (using _Generic) to make a wrapper for the 
> function, such that one does not even need to go through and update the call 
> sites to add or remove the & .

If _Generic is needed, you have outgrown C. (I am regularly baffled by the weird 
useless things added to C, but the *needed* things are totally ignored.)

> However going back to the original point, as of late last year / early this year 
> it is now obsolete.  That specific example of switching the code to use . or -> 
> is something which the LLM assisted coding agents are particularly adept at.

D doesn't need a coding agent to refactor the code. It paid off handsomely with 
the Warp program I did a few years ago. I found it very easy to try different 
algorithms and data structures.

> Such refactoring tasks are what I've been using it for, where it is quite easy 
> to specify some form of grep pattern and then rules to update the code.  So 
> these days that'll take less than an hour to achieve.

I've done these sorts of refactorings. It takes 0 minutes, because the compiler 
figures it out and does it. It also doesn't wind up with a blizzard of diffs in 
the git history. It doesn't need code reviewing, either.

As I've become more experienced, my tolerance for all the weird kludges 
necessary for professional C getting lower and lower. LLMs don't really solve 
the problem, as the wrangled C code is just as ugly looking.

I've used LLMs to a modest extent, and am impressed by it. So, I might be wrong 
about the above. But it's fun to talk about it!