January 15, 2012
On 1/15/2012 6:47 AM, Robert Clipsham wrote:
> Might be worth adding this as a comment on the pull request!


Yes, please do.
January 15, 2012
"Andrei Alexandrescu" <SeeWebsiteForEmail@erdani.org> wrote in message news:jetha2$2csv$1@digitalmars.com...
>
> 2. We haven't identified game designers as a core market, and one that's more important than e.g. general purpose programmers who need the like of working qualifiers, multithreading, and shared libraries.
>

I have to strongly take issue with this one. Let's take a look at what D intends to be:

A multi-paradigm, natively-compiled, systems language that's designed as a reimagined C++, and is better at high-level than C++, and goes every bit as low-level as C++.

How the fuck does that *not* implicitly say "game dev" already?

Hell, it's already *more* of a gamedev langauge than a "general purpose programmers" langauge anyway: General purpose programmers *already* have fucking billions of VM and interpreted langauges that most of them are perfectly happy with. What the hell do game devs have besides D? Umm, C++...*sort of* C# (which isn't nearly as good at gamedev as D anyway)...and, oh yea, that's it! If it weren't the the prospect of gamedev, I never would have even gotten into D in the first place.

It doesn't matter if *you've* identified game dev as a market you care about: D *is already* a gamedev language. And gamedev is already an *ideal* audience for D to target.

(And like other have mentioned: Derelict - a game oriented library - is one of the *oldest* still-alive D libs out there.)


January 15, 2012
On 15-01-2012 21:57, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> "Andrei Alexandrescu"<SeeWebsiteForEmail@erdani.org>  wrote in message
> news:jetha2$2csv$1@digitalmars.com...
>>
>> 2. We haven't identified game designers as a core market, and one that's
>> more important than e.g. general purpose programmers who need the like of
>> working qualifiers, multithreading, and shared libraries.
>>
>
> I have to strongly take issue with this one. Let's take a look at what D
> intends to be:
>
> A multi-paradigm, natively-compiled, systems language that's designed as a
> reimagined C++, and is better at high-level than C++, and goes every bit as
> low-level as C++.
>
> How the fuck does that *not* implicitly say "game dev" already?
>
> Hell, it's already *more* of a gamedev langauge than a "general purpose
> programmers" langauge anyway: General purpose programmers *already* have
> fucking billions of VM and interpreted langauges that most of them are
> perfectly happy with. What the hell do game devs have besides D? Umm,
> C++...*sort of* C# (which isn't nearly as good at gamedev as D
> anyway)...and, oh yea, that's it! If it weren't the the prospect of gamedev,
> I never would have even gotten into D in the first place.
>
> It doesn't matter if *you've* identified game dev as a market you care
> about: D *is already* a gamedev language. And gamedev is already an *ideal*
> audience for D to target.
>
> (And like other have mentioned: Derelict - a game oriented library - is one
> of the *oldest* still-alive D libs out there.)
>
>
.
And yet, D's situation on Windows, the main gaming platform, is less than ideal. If we're really going to cater to game devs, we need to fix the entire Windows situation long before adding SIMD, IMHO.

That being said, I do agree that D is a great language for game dev. It's really just the Windows tool chain that's in a rather bad state.

--
- Alex
January 15, 2012
On Sunday, January 15, 2012 18:42:25 Kiith-Sa wrote:
> To be clear: I'm not saying that fixing the advertised features is unimportant. In fact, the greatest problems I see in promoting D are that we don't even have finished containers in the API - and that many features described in TDPL don't work correctly. But I find the statement that SIMD is a waste of time, or, for that matter, that it will help little in promoting D's adoption - to be completely incorrect.


I think that given what D is setting out to do, game developers are among its target user base and that if we can add features to the language or libraries which make D more reasonable for them, that's great. Having SIMD support is definitely not a bad thing. Personally, I will _never_ use it, but it's something that C/C++ can do on many compilers and having that in D doesn't hurt people like me who don't care about the feature at all.

The problem is that there are more important things that not only affect game developers but affect developers in general which D already promises to do but fails to do. So, stuff like SIMD should be relatively low on the priority list until the more general purpose features have been fully implemented. And given that the general purpose stuff _also_ affects the game devs, I would have thought that they'd also really want that fixed soon, just like everyone else. Some of the same people who are clamoring for SIMD have been clamoring for fixes to const.

Walter is free to spend his time how he chooses. I don't really want to bash him for going off and doing something different and interesting, but I do think that from the perspective of the D community at large, the SIMD work is not something that's high enough on the priority list to be done right now. Eventually, yes, but not now.

So, hopefully it doesn't take much longer for the SIMD stuff to be sorted out, and then progress can be made on the more general purpose stuff again.

- Jonathan M Davis
January 16, 2012
On 1/15/12 11:42 AM, Kiith-Sa wrote:
> I'm interested in game development using D, so I'll post my opinion.
>
> I think the discussions here show how particularly specialized people
> here are. I've seen some Manu's posts and it was clear that he is a person
> in gamedev who thinks most development is like gamedev and can't see the bigger
> picture. For a gamedev person, SIMD support is not simply a cool feature, it's
> a gamechanger. Just like const, ranges, D threading features and so on. However,
> his posts often show that he doesn't understand positions of other people in other
> areas, e.g. people here working on scientific computing, who are also interested
> in SIMD but their thinking of terms such as "vector" is completely different.
>
> I think you're making the same mistake here - you have very little (or no?)
> idea about gamedev and aren't exposed to game programmers, so you just assume
> specific gamedev issues don't exist or are unimportant. I don't think you get
> much of exposure to game devs when evangelizing D either - you don't evangelize
> D in game companies.
[snip]

You are making a good point, and I'm glad you chimed in.

I do have ties with the gaming community; I taught a course at ENDI and I am well acquainted with a few game developers. Also, at conferences and events gaming programmers are represented. Finally, game developers who are reading TDPL are likely to send me book feedback and questions in proportion to their representation. From where I stand, I can say there is more interest in D in other communities than in gaming.

Clearly gamedev-specific issues do exist and are important. But that's not even remotely the point. Allow me to explain.

Say we identified gaming programmers as an important community to address. If that happened, we would have done a /lot/ of things differently, and a ton of them before SIMD. That means focus on Windows64, graphic accelerators, and gaming CPUs. To claim that work on SIMD is good because it's good for gamers is to reverse engineer a rationalization after the fact. And the fact is - Walter has had the gusto to implement SIMD now. Technically, that's great. For gamers, that's an interesting development. Organizationally, that's a poor statement.

Again: if D is a hobby we have, all's great. Otherwise, we must show people that we are serious about finishing the core language implementation, that we make promises that we are able to keep, and that we make plans that we follow even in the broadest strokes. If we want to play with the big boys, we need to change the way we approach planning and organization quite drastically.


Andrei
January 16, 2012
"Alex Rønne Petersen" <xtzgzorex@gmail.com> wrote in message news:jevgk4$2nq3$1@digitalmars.com...
> On 15-01-2012 21:57, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>> "Andrei Alexandrescu"<SeeWebsiteForEmail@erdani.org>  wrote in message news:jetha2$2csv$1@digitalmars.com...
>>>
>>> 2. We haven't identified game designers as a core market, and one that's
>>> more important than e.g. general purpose programmers who need the like
>>> of
>>> working qualifiers, multithreading, and shared libraries.
>>>
>>
>> I have to strongly take issue with this one. Let's take a look at what D intends to be:
>>
>> A multi-paradigm, natively-compiled, systems language that's designed as
>> a
>> reimagined C++, and is better at high-level than C++, and goes every bit
>> as
>> low-level as C++.
>>
>> How the fuck does that *not* implicitly say "game dev" already?
>>
>> Hell, it's already *more* of a gamedev langauge than a "general purpose
>> programmers" langauge anyway: General purpose programmers *already* have
>> fucking billions of VM and interpreted langauges that most of them are
>> perfectly happy with. What the hell do game devs have besides D? Umm,
>> C++...*sort of* C# (which isn't nearly as good at gamedev as D
>> anyway)...and, oh yea, that's it! If it weren't the the prospect of
>> gamedev,
>> I never would have even gotten into D in the first place.
>>
>> It doesn't matter if *you've* identified game dev as a market you care
>> about: D *is already* a gamedev language. And gamedev is already an
>> *ideal*
>> audience for D to target.
>>
>> (And like other have mentioned: Derelict - a game oriented library - is
>> one
>> of the *oldest* still-alive D libs out there.)
>>
>>
> .
> And yet, D's situation on Windows, the main gaming platform, is less than
> ideal. If we're really going to cater to game devs, we need to fix the
> entire Windows situation long before adding SIMD, IMHO.
>
> That being said, I do agree that D is a great language for game dev. It's really just the Windows tool chain that's in a rather bad state.
>

I'm on windows, and I think it's good enough. Yes, it *is* definitely a problem for new D users, but all the OMF/COFF stuff *does* have viable workarounds, so it's not exactly a dealbreaking issue.


January 16, 2012
"Nick Sabalausky" <a@a.a> wrote in message news:jf0au6$12jv$1@digitalmars.com...
> "Alex Rønne Petersen" <xtzgzorex@gmail.com> wrote in message news:jevgk4$2nq3$1@digitalmars.com...
>> .
>> And yet, D's situation on Windows, the main gaming platform, is less than
>> ideal. If we're really going to cater to game devs, we need to fix the
>> entire Windows situation long before adding SIMD, IMHO.
>>
>> That being said, I do agree that D is a great language for game dev. It's really just the Windows tool chain that's in a rather bad state.
>>
>
> I'm on windows, and I think it's good enough. Yes, it *is* definitely a problem for new D users, but all the OMF/COFF stuff *does* have viable workarounds, so it's not exactly a dealbreaking issue.
>

Of course, I don't mean to say the windows toolchain is perfectly ok as-is, or that it doesn't have big issues that do need to be resolved (prefereably sooner than later). I'm just saying it isn't a blocking matter. Critical, maybe, but not blocking.

Oh, and Windows is the main *desktop* gaming platform. Not so sure about "main gaming platform" as desktop gaming itself is mostly (I said "mostly", not "entirely") limited to PopCap-grannies and a vocal-but-minority group of kids who sink hundreds of dollars into their overpowered rigs every year (I would know - I used to be one of them (the kids, not the grannies ;) ) until I grew up).

Although, with all the non-desktop gaming platforms, D's toolchain may actually be *worse* on than on windows. *That* needs to be fixed - much moreso than the windows issues, IMO. Hell, even with non-gaming, can D currently be used on mobile at all? These are exactly the sorts of platforms where D really fits *best*. These systems have limited langauge options and high requirements for a good langauge - desktop and web people (like me :/ ) already have five gazillion languages.


January 16, 2012
On Sun, 15 Jan 2012 18:23:38 -0600
Andrei Alexandrescu <SeeWebsiteForEmail@erdani.org> wrote:

> Again: if D is a hobby we have, all's great. Otherwise, we must show people that we are serious about finishing the core language implementation, that we make promises that we are able to keep, and that we make plans that we follow even in the broadest strokes. If we want to play with the big boys, we need to change the way we approach planning and organization quite drastically.

Thank you Andrei for this post...it's the essence of the problem!!

Playing with compiler & language features, running some (artificial) benchmarks to compare with other languages etc. is nice for a hobby project and may attract hobby programmers, but making language & 8its ecoysstem attractive for serious projects is not so easy.

Whenever we mention D as the language for our project, we always get the feedback it's not safe investment of our time & energy and it would be better to use something else, either C(++), Java, Scala, Python etc.

Recently I was evaluating one CMS written in one popular Python framework and after reporting bug which makes it unusable for even simple page layout, hearing nothing from the developer and then seeing it's fixed after more than two months, it was not difficult to abandon idea to base our sites on such a product.

This is one of the comments I got in Oct '10 when asking at SO: "Based on this i lost all hope that D has enough developers to be a save language pick for a company doing a larger mission critical application. You will fight with the tool chain and even pray to go back to C++ often."

I know that many things improved in D, but the question remains how much the public opinion is channging? (I know that users still speak about lighttpd leaking memory, and it's not easy to get rid of it.)


Sincerely,
Gour


-- 
The working senses are superior to dull matter; mind is higher than the senses; intelligence is still higher than the mind; and he [the soul] is even higher than the intelligence.

http://atmarama.net | Hlapicina (Croatia) | GPG: 52B5C810


January 16, 2012
On Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:57:27 -0500
"Nick Sabalausky" <a@a.a> wrote:

> It doesn't matter if *you've* identified game dev as a market you care about: D *is already* a gamedev language. And gamedev is already an *ideal* audience for D to target.

Then it would be nice if the gamedev industry could identify D as gamedev language as well and pour some $s, €s...to support/speed up development, but I wonder why it does not happen. ;)


Sincerely,
Gour


-- 
Bewildered by the modes of material nature, the ignorant fully engage themselves in material activities and become attached. But the wise should not unsettle them, although these duties are inferior due to the performers' lack of knowledge.

http://atmarama.net | Hlapicina (Croatia) | GPG: 52B5C810


January 16, 2012
On Mon, 2012-01-16 at 09:03 +0100, Gour wrote:
[...]
> Then it would be nice if the gamedev industry could identify D as gamedev language as well and pour some $s, €s...to support/speed up development, but I wonder why it does not happen. ;)

<devils-advocate>
The games industry works with C, C++, assembly language, Python and Lua.
They have serious toolchains for working with serious graphics and
modeling libraries.  The last thing they need is a new, incomplete,
poorly resourced, one-man-band implementation programming language with
very few programmers, and no experience of being used in this arena.

Existing games company executives would be labelled as suicidal to switch from the current toolchains to the lack of toolchain infrastructure that is D.  Thus D has no chance of any traction in that arena unless it can show a huge decrease in time to market, and massive increase in quality of game (gameplay management, speed of rendering, etc.) -- not just theoretically, but actually.

Working with Visual Studio is the only route to Windows market.  This means working in harmony with the C and C++ toolchains.

In the current climate D has no chance in the game industry. </devils-advocate>

On the constructive front, what D needs is a few startups to use it and be successful.  The only way to get traction and create success in the current state of the world is to already have success.  The way of getting that is to have people who have nothing to lose and everything to gain, even if they have no money, use it to create successful systems and promulgate a culture of success.

Any system and community that doubts itself won't be taken seriously. Any system and community that gets too introverted and/or arrogant is doomed.  cf. Ruby, Scala, ...

Fortran is a special case.

-- 
Russel. ============================================================================= Dr Russel Winder      t: +44 20 7585 2200   voip: sip:russel.winder@ekiga.net 41 Buckmaster Road    m: +44 7770 465 077   xmpp: russel@russel.org.uk London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk  skype: russel_winder