On 26/10/2010 04:42, Walter Bright wrote:
> Rainer Deyke wrote:
>> On 10/25/2010 19:01, Walter Bright wrote:
>>> Yes, we discussed it before. The Digital Mars C/C++ compiler does this,
>>> and NOBODY CARES.
>>> Not one person in 25 years has ever even commented on it. Nobody
>>> commented on its lack in dmd.
>>
>> I think someone just did.
>
> Only because clang made a marketing issue out of it. Nobody coming from
> dmc++ noticed.
>
> I used to point out this feature in dmc++ to users. Nobody cared, I'd
> just get blank looks. Why would I drop it if people wanted it?
>

Could this be because of some particular bias or idiosyncrasy on the part of dmc++ users? Any idea what the C++ user community at large would think of a such a feature, prior to Clang?

I'm trying to think back to days when I used VS C++ 6 and VS C++ 2003, but I can't remember if the error messages were just line-based, or had more precision than that.


As for me, I think this functionality is useful, but only significantly so when integrated into an IDE/editor.

-- 
Bruno Medeiros - Software Engineer

Bruno Medeiros:
> Why is that? What would cause a loss in compile speed even if this option was turned off?

Maybe because the data structures used to keep the data around are used and kept even when you disable that feature (the switch just disables the printing).

Bye,
bearophile

On 24/11/2010 17:33, bearophile wrote:
> Bruno Medeiros:
>> Why is that? What would cause a loss in compile speed even if this
>> option was turned off?
>
> Maybe because the data structures used to keep the data around are used and kept even when you disable that feature (the switch just disables the printing).
>
> Bye,
> bearophile

So was Walter talking about GCC specifically, not the feature in general, theoretical terms (ie, as applied to any compiler)?

-- 
Bruno Medeiros - Software Engineer

Bruno Medeiros:

> So was Walter talking about GCC specifically, not the feature in general, theoretical terms (ie, as applied to any compiler)?

I think he was talking about the version of DMC present at that time.

It is possible to disable a field in a data structure, but you may need to double the code (template it), or put that datum at the end of the node structs and not allocate&use it according to a runtime switch, etc.

Bye,
bearophile