- about 55% Windows 8.1/64 (but development mostly using DMD/32, except for cases where the MS linker is needed)
- about 40%  Linux Mint/64
- the rest on Mac/64 and rarely FreeBSD/64

I'm most used to Windows and still have a few applications (graphics) that only run there + also develop GUI applications that need to be tested there constantly, but the main reason development-wise is still quick access to the VisualStudio debugger.

However, Cinnamon looks really nice and I'm considering switching back to mostly Linux. Working on Mac OS just never felt quite as efficient as on the other systems, mostly due to the awkward keyboard layout and key combinations required there.

64-bit OS... mostly to make full use of the system RAM and the CPU and because the memory overhead doesn't really matter.

On Wed, 2014-02-05 at 07:55 -0600, 1100110 wrote:
> On 2/5/14, 6:55, Gary Willoughby wrote:
[…]
> > Yes use brew *not* macports. The reason is brew is more well behaved where it installs libs and doesn't need root permissions.
> 
> Oh good, I came very close to installing macports yesterday.  Thanks!

I started using MacPorts long before Brew existed. MacPorts has improved massively over the last couple of years. If I was starting from scratch I would probably install Brew, but now I'm a MacPort user I'll probably stick. Brew refuses to install on a MacPort using machine, and there seems no way of telling Brew to install it's version of everything there was in a MacPort installation. AFAIK anyway.

For packagers I would say targetting an installer, MacPorts and Brew for OSX is like doing a tarball, deb and rpm for Linux.

-- 
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@winder.org.uk London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk  skype: russel_winder

The problem I've had with MacPorts is that a bunch of ports are
just broken (meld, for instance).  I've had a lot more success
getting apps I pick to actually run when obtained via Homebrew.

As for OS... I used to target Solaris.  Linux isn't perfect, but
at least it isn't that pile of junk.

On Tuesday, February 04, 2014 16:18:24 Steve Teale wrote:
> Popped into my head today.
> 
> What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?

64-bit Linux (currently on OpenSuSE, though I was on Arch for quite a while)

> And why?

Because that's what my desktop is and the environment that I prefer to have for my computer in general (with KDE). 32-bit should just die at this point IMHO (though it'll probably be a while before that happens), and I only deal with Windows if I have to and have no interest in anything from Apple, so I'm not going to be on either Windows or Mac OS X. Out of the supported environments, that only leaves FreeBSD, and while I could presumably get that pretty close to what I'm used to on Linux, I also see no point in messing with it over Linux other than to mess with it for the fun of it. So, I'm on 64-bit Linux almost all the time, including for anything I do with D.

- Jonathan M Davis

On Wednesday, 5 February 2014 at 12:07:38 UTC, Russel Winder wrote:
> On Wed, 2014-02-05 at 12:04 +0000, Russel Winder wrote:
>> On Tue, 2014-02-04 at 16:18 +0000, Steve Teale wrote:
>> > Popped into my head today.
>> > 
>> > What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?
>> 
>> I am on Linux mainly. 64-bit only.
>> 
>> > And why?
>> 
>> Because I have 8 or 12GB of main memory.
>
> That answers the why 64-bit. Why Linux? because FreeBSD and OpenBSD
> don't have traction, Windows is simply unacceptable, and I do use OSX a
> bit (so I guess I do use a form of FreeBSD).

I think that the only difference from OSX to *BSD is the GUI (I've hear that). But *BSD still are very good and can run any OSX/Linux application as native. I'm fine with that.

Am Tue, 04 Feb 2014 16:18:24 +0000
schrieb "Steve Teale" <steve.teale@britseyeview.com>:

> Popped into my head today.
> 
> What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?
> 
> And why?

Linux 64-bit.

The reason for 64-bit is simple. It means less pressure on the
address space (e.g. no more running out of virtual memory),
more CPU registers, more recent instructions (SSE3 is supported
on all amd64 CPUs) as well as reworked calling conventions.
In other words: All the good stuff.

I don't quite remember my reason for Linux back then.
But it probably comes down to those:

o finding out why Linux was becoming more and more popular
o trying and learning something new and getting past the routine
  of just installing the latest version of Windows every 2 years
o having a configurable system with only the background
  services I need and know about

Now I could add:

o very low virus threat
o my current system came only with a 32-bit Vista, but on Linux
  I could leverage the 64-bit potential of my CPU
o the joy of witnessing how the desktop experience and drivers
  become improved over time on Linux (automatic input device
  discovery, audio equalizers, video thumbnails, etc.)
o the ease of getting GDC or LDC running, because LLVM and GCC
  are part of most Linux distributions
o D and most *nix systems share their preference for UTF-8,
  whereas on Windows you have to be more aware of code pages
  unless an API is wchar based. That ranges from
  stdout.writeln to APIs like OpenAL.

-- 
Marco

On Tuesday, 4 February 2014 at 16:18:24 UTC, Steve Teale wrote:
> Popped into my head today.
>
> What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?
>
> And why?

OK, I'm clear about why Linux, but 64 bit I'm less clear about. What's the attraction about a system that's a memory hog, but not noticeably quicker, and where you have to do cross compilation to make applications that are usable by the vast proportion of world computer users?

On Sunday, 9 February 2014 at 18:16:09 UTC, Steve Teale wrote:
> On Tuesday, 4 February 2014 at 16:18:24 UTC, Steve Teale wrote:
>> Popped into my head today.
>>
>> What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?
>>
>> And why?
>
> OK, I'm clear about why Linux, but 64 bit I'm less clear about. What's the attraction about a system that's a memory hog, but not noticeably quicker, and where you have to do cross compilation to make applications that are usable by the vast proportion of world computer users?

64 bit is pretty ubiquitous in the laptop/desktop/server/cluster world*. The extra registers is occasionally important, as is the guarantee of SSE2.

Memory is dirt cheap these days, so that really isn't a problem. The larger address space is important for security reasons, as well as the obvious ease of use of more RAM in a single process.

*and if you're straying out of that world then cross compilation is standard anyway.

On Sunday, 9 February 2014 at 19:21:08 UTC, John Colvin wrote:
> On Sunday, 9 February 2014 at 18:16:09 UTC, Steve Teale wrote:
>> On Tuesday, 4 February 2014 at 16:18:24 UTC, Steve Teale wrote:
>>> Popped into my head today.
>>>
>>> What proportion of the D community develops on Linux of some sort, and what proportion works with a 64 bit OS?
>>>
>>> And why?
>>
>> OK, I'm clear about why Linux, but 64 bit I'm less clear about. What's the attraction about a system that's a memory hog, but not noticeably quicker, and where you have to do cross compilation to make applications that are usable by the vast proportion of world computer users?
>
> 64 bit is pretty ubiquitous in the laptop/desktop/server/cluster world*. The extra registers is occasionally important, as is the guarantee of SSE2.
>
> Memory is dirt cheap these days, so that really isn't a problem. The larger address space is important for security reasons, as well as the obvious ease of use of more RAM in a single process.
>
> *and if you're straying out of that world then cross compilation is standard anyway.

Just to clarify, of course I am talking from an x86-centric
viewpoint.

On Sun, 2014-02-09 at 18:16 +0000, Steve Teale wrote:
[…]
> OK, I'm clear about why Linux, but 64 bit I'm less clear about. What's the attraction about a system that's a memory hog, but not noticeably quicker, and where you have to do cross compilation to make applications that are usable by the vast proportion of world computer users?

I do not understand the "memory hog" gibe, but yes 32-bit, 64-bit is not a speed thing. Everyone I know who uses a computer always has 8GB or more of memory, so 32-bit OS is not an option. I guess the vast proportion of world computer users are now phone and tablet users so yes can probably survive with a mere 32-bit OS.

Developers with a decent system should have no problem at all building both 32-bit and 64-bit versions, so I don't see "cross compilation" as an issue. A far bigger issue is how the $$$$ can you support all the variants of Windows, OSX, Linux, etc. without a CI/build farm. This is why we like the JVM ;-)

-- 
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@winder.org.uk London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk  skype: russel_winder