Edward Diener Wrote:

> Bill Baxter wrote:
> > Edward Diener wrote:
> > 
> >> D has some really nice features but it really needs much better language documentation to attract programmers, especially C++ programmers.
> > 
> > Hah, I think the same thing every time I'm forced to try to use a boost library.  :-)   Like just today when I had to go look at Boost::MPL to see what it was all about.
> 
> That is a little unfair as you are comparing documentation about a computer language library to documentation about a computer language itself.

I think it's reasonable -- boost is increasingly looking like a standard library for C++; it can be compared to D's library docs, at least.
Your point about D's docs is valid, though -- they could certainly be better.

> > The book with the misleading title is about Tango, actually.
> 
> OK. Hopefully it will about D enough for me to pick up the particulars better than I have been able to do from the specification.

My opinion (as the technical reviewer of the book) was that the template section discussed things from a C++ mindset, which is probably helpful for a C++ programmer; yet it gives less detail on the interesting unique-to-D stuff which renders many C++ techniques obsolete.

The underlying "problem" is that about a year ago, Walter suddenly stuffed a raft of enormously powerful features into the language in a very short space of time. Suddenly we had tuples, string mixins, and CTFE, and D wasn't playing catch-up with C++ any more. The showcase examples of template metaprogramming became obsolete overnight. We still haven't worked out the idioms for how to use it all; there are some fascinating synergies with existing features.

Which makes documentation, especially the most useful "how-to" kind quite difficult to write at this stage. But I reckon a "metaprogramming tips and tricks" Wiki page would be pretty useful.

-Don.

== Quote from Don Clugston (nospam@nospam.com)'s article
> Edward Diener Wrote:
> >
> > OK. Hopefully it will about D enough for me to pick up the particulars better than I have been able to do from the specification.
> My opinion (as the technical reviewer of the book) was that the template section discussed things from a C++ mindset, which is probably
helpful for a C++ programmer; yet it gives less detail on the interesting unique-to-D stuff which renders many C++ techniques obsolete.

Yup.  That was a somewhat contentious decision on my part.  Since C++ is the only other language with templates I wanted to be sure the reader understood templates in general with the hope that it would provide a good base to build on.  As a result, because of the length limitation of the book, the chapter doesn't talk too much about some of the newer or more advanced features that D offers such as tuples.

Regarding "Tango with D" in general though... very little of the book is Tango-specific.  We made a deliberate effort to make the language our primary focus.


Sean

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 21:37:41 +0000, Sean Kelly wrote:

> == Quote from Don Clugston (nospam@nospam.com)'s article
>> Edward Diener Wrote:
>> >
>> > OK. Hopefully it will about D enough for me to pick up the particulars better than I have been able to do from the specification.
>> My opinion (as the technical reviewer of the book) was that the template section discussed things from a C++ mindset, which is probably
> helpful for a C++ programmer; yet it gives less detail on the interesting unique-to-D stuff which renders many C++ techniques obsolete.
> 
> Yup.  That was a somewhat contentious decision on my part.  Since C++ is the only other language with templates I wanted to be sure the reader understood templates in general with the hope that it would provide a good base to build on.  As a result, because of the length limitation of the book, the chapter doesn't talk too much about some of the newer or more advanced features that D offers such as tuples.
> 
> Regarding "Tango with D" in general though... very little of the book is Tango-specific.  We made a deliberate effort to make the language our primary focus.
> 
> 
> Sean

I would like to compliment that effort, as it is IMO that the book was very well section in terms of what is D and what is Tango. I also think the book was very well written by all authors. I hope a book that goes into more of the specialties and details of D can be written with this quality.