[dmd-internals] Pulling D language enhancements

[Walter Bright via dmd-internals]

On 10/9/2014 10:43 PM, Daniel Murphy wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 10, 2014 at 3:07 PM, Walter Bright via dmd-internals
> <dmd-internals at puremagic.com> wrote:
>
>> if the language design change is rejected, then the PR author's coding
>> effort has gone to waste. We don't have the luxury of throwing peoples' work
>> away like that. It pains me very much when this happens.
> Walter, this is the most effective way to push for decision on
> enhancements.  You have an awful track record at deciding on
> theoretical changes.  It is _supposed_ to pain you when the work gets
> thrown away.

Throwing a valuable contributor's code away should not factor into a decision as 
to whether a language enhancement is a good idea or not. But doing it this way 
makes it a factor. This does not lead to the best decisions.


>
>> So please, please, before submitting a PR that involves a language change,
>> be sure you've got agreement and approval for the change. Otherwise, you
>> risk wasting your time in a most frustrating matter.
> Following this would result in near-zero enhancement PRs.  Is that
> what you want?

We need to approach language changes with increasing caution, not less. We get a 
lot of flak, some of it deserved, for reaching for shiny new features rather 
than doing the drudgery of making existing features work correctly.


>
>> I'm also OK with others pulling PR implementations for language changes when
>> the language changes have already been approved.
> That didn't work so well with adding the virtual keyword.

Point taken. That was a failure of process.