On Tuesday, 1 September 2020 at 14:00:19 UTC, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> But Walter is never going to approve any changes here, as this is one area where he will not budge, due to past experience with the C Preprocessor abuse. So this discussion is only academic. Just use the workarounds and move on.

Whoever would do horrible deeds with `version` is still able to do all of them with `static if`, meanwhile the good guys are stuck with this wooden syntax. Seems a bit irrational to me.

I feel like beating a dead horse. Surely it has been discussed ad infinitum. And after all, it’s not such a big deal, it’s not like you have to juggle versions in your code all the time. But things like that are no good for D’s public image.

On Tuesday, 1 September 2020 at 16:29:57 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
>
> So for the or we have something like:
>
> version(a) version = a_or_b;
> else version(b) version = a_or_b;
>
> Not too bad if you don't have many. And if you do:
>
> https://run.dlang.io/is/CZ5B6z
>
> I'll see myself out.

Why stop on `a` and `b` though?

https://run.dlang.io/is/u1GuZs

On 9/1/20 2:36 PM, Ogi wrote:
> On Tuesday, 1 September 2020 at 14:00:19 UTC, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
>> But Walter is never going to approve any changes here, as this is one area where he will not budge, due to past experience with the C Preprocessor abuse. So this discussion is only academic. Just use the workarounds and move on.
> 
> Whoever would do horrible deeds with `version` is still able to do all of them with `static if`, meanwhile the good guys are stuck with this wooden syntax. Seems a bit irrational to me.
> 
> I feel like beating a dead horse. Surely it has been discussed ad infinitum. And after all, it’s not such a big deal, it’s not like you have to juggle versions in your code all the time. But things like that are no good for D’s public image.

Well I can tell that I don't mind the limitations of version at all, and I enjoy the distinction. There are many features in a programming language that are more powerful than others and could supplant them (foreach/for/while/goto, overloading/templates, switch/if etc).

Economy of means is an underrated principle of writing code (and in general). So if I'm in a place where version would fit, version it is. Otherwise I decide, for a reason, that static if is to be reached for. All of that would be hardly irrational.

On Thu, Sep 03, 2020 at 12:21:35PM -0400, Andrei Alexandrescu via Digitalmars-d wrote: [...]
> Economy of means is an underrated principle of writing code (and in general). So if I'm in a place where version would fit, version it is. Otherwise I decide, for a reason, that static if is to be reached for. All of that would be hardly irrational.

+1.  Economy of means is highly underrated these days, but it is a powerful principle that helps you write better code.


T

-- 
Amateurs built the Ark; professionals built the Titanic.

On Thursday, 3 September 2020 at 16:49:24 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote:
> --
> Amateurs built the Arc, Professionals built the Titanic

Do you choose your signature or are they random?
(I doubt it, because they're so often so fitting)

On Friday, 4 September 2020 at 05:58:31 UTC, Dominikus Dittes Scherkl wrote:
> On Thursday, 3 September 2020 at 16:49:24 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote:
>> --
>> Amateurs built the Arc, Professionals built the Titanic
>
> Do you choose your signature or are they random?
> (I doubt it, because they're so often so fitting)

The quote implies that the Ark was a better boat than the Titanic. This is obviously incorrect in terms of capacity, facilities and lifetime. It was Marketing that ruined the Titanic, not the engineers. (Plus the Ark is fictional and impractical).

On Saturday, 5 September 2020 at 12:27:19 UTC, Nick Treleaven wrote:

> Titanic, not the engineers. (Plus the Ark is fictional and

That depends on who is telling the narrative.  While secularism captured mainstream science long ago, aided initially by since-proven fraudulent fossil finds, creation science has now advanced to a level that proves evolution false in many, many ways.  You just won't get that information in the mainstream.

> impractical).

The ark design has been investigated by engineers and found to be incredibly seaworthy for what it was designed for.  Not every species that we see today was present on the ark, only a few from each kind was needed.  Rapid speciation occurred after they spread out over the earth, but all still remained within their initial kind.  Eg.  we can trace all dogs today back to wolves, so all that was needed were two wolves on the ark.  Similarly for other animals.

On Thursday, 10 September 2020 at 03:30:17 UTC, dweldon wrote:
> On Saturday, 5 September 2020 at 12:27:19 UTC, Nick Treleaven wrote:
>
>> Titanic, not the engineers. (Plus the Ark is fictional and
>
> That depends on who is telling the narrative.  While secularism captured mainstream science long ago, aided initially by since-proven fraudulent fossil finds, creation science has now advanced to a level that proves evolution false in many, many ways.  You just won't get that information in the mainstream.
>
>> impractical).
>
> The ark design has been investigated by engineers and found to be incredibly seaworthy for what it was designed for.  Not every species that we see today was present on the ark, only a few from each kind was needed.  Rapid speciation occurred after they spread out over the earth, but all still remained within their initial kind.  Eg.  we can trace all dogs today back to wolves, so all that was needed were two wolves on the ark.  Similarly for other animals.

Just... no. This is not the place for a debate over pseudoscience.

--
  Simen

On Thursday, 10 September 2020 at 08:00:23 UTC, Simen Kjærås wrote:
>
> Just... no. This is not the place for a debate over pseudoscience.

Well have got a good laugh out of it.
I don't think a debate would possibly start here.

He didn't mention emacs vs. vim after all.