January 18, 2022
On 1/18/2022 7:45 AM, H. S. Teoh wrote:
> It's the familiarity syndrome.  If you're the one who wrote the
> compiler, you already have a deep understanding of how it works
> internally, and that understanding colors your perception of the error
> mesage.  However, someone who *didn't* write the compiler has no idea
> where the compiler is coming from, so to speak, and so what's obvious to
> you may be completely opaque to him.
> 
> Familiarity also biases you, so that you fail to see flaws that are
> obvious to everyone else, because you have been acclimatized to expect
> certain things and unconsciously assume they are there even when they're
> actually missing.  Just like how spectators to a chess game often notice
> things that the heavily-invested players may miss, because they're too
> focused on seeing the game from one particular viewpoint and thus may
> neglect some other aspect.


You're right, and that's *exactly* why bugzilla issues need to be filed, along with sample code.

I cannot read other peoples' minds.
January 18, 2022
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 19:39:11 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> Please don't make us guess what you're referring to. If you want to bring up a specific issue here, please provide a link.

I gave titles there, the search ought to find the link instantly.

But, ok, here's a few more:

https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3818

*12 years old*

https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=8102

*10 years old*

Both of those are examples of where the compiler just vomits irrelevant messages. If you know the compiler already, the first message is actually useful enough - you know to look at the first one and the line it gives or the one immediately before.

But it still could just do something better.

And here's another big one:

https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5096

*11 years old*

And hey, look, a comment I left there two years ago - often, when I go to put it in bugzilla and find something already there, I'll comment instead of making a duplicate.

Those first ones are fairly minor, I've gotten used to them and they only take a few seconds. But that brace mismatch one actually eats a *significant* amount of time every time it happens.

At least the overload and template constraint messages have gotten better recently though they're still pretty bad. And those opDispatch messages are so unbelievably bad it sometimes doesn't even issue them and just generates invalid code instead! <https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=20808> (2 years old - and it worked before that, hence why it is a regression) But even when it does issue an error, it is just "no such property" which is well-known.

Or the new attributes issue errors at the wrong place <https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=17374> (5 years old!) making using them with inferred templates much harder than it needs to be.

And it isn't just me getting these - error messages come up a lot in new user support.
January 19, 2022
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 08:42:17 UTC, Mike Parker wrote:
> On Monday, 17 January 2022 at 23:42:50 UTC, forkit wrote:
> ...
> My point: issues that aren't reported aren't fixed, and those that are reported have a better chance of getting fixed sooner these days than they used to.
>
> Please report your issues...

Hi Parker,

First of all forkit excuse for hijacking your post, I was about to create a topic about this, but I decided to try here instead. I have this idea for awhile.

Wouldn't be possible to have a new Group in this "Forum" called "Bugs"? So instead of new users need to create an account just to file a bug on bugzilla, It only would be needed to post there, and someone would look around and set that (Via automation of course) to open o bug report on bugzilla through that post. Since this forum is pretty much an e-mail server I think this wouldn't be difficult to handle.

Why is that? There are a lot of developers asking for help testing their software, but every time is hassle to open different accounts in different places.

I think this idea would be pretty neat and easy to contribute and we could visit the topic later to ask for updates.

What do you think?

Matheus.
January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 00:31:35 UTC, matheus wrote:
> Wouldn't be possible to have a new Group in this "Forum" called "Bugs"? So instead of new users need to create an account just to file a bug on bugzilla, It only would be needed to post there, and someone would look around and set that (Via automation of course) to open o bug report on bugzilla through that post. Since this forum is pretty much an e-mail server I think this wouldn't be difficult to handle.

There already is such a group:

https://forum.dlang.org/group/issues

However, it mostly just contains automated emails about bugzilla issues, so most people don't pay much attention to it.
January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 00:59:27 UTC, Paul Backus wrote:
> On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 00:31:35 UTC, matheus wrote:
>> Wouldn't be possible to have a new Group in this "Forum" called "Bugs"? So instead of new users need to create an account just to file a bug on bugzilla, It only would be needed to post there, and someone would look around and set that (Via automation of course) to open o bug report on bugzilla through that post. Since this forum is pretty much an e-mail server I think this wouldn't be difficult to handle.
>
> There already is such a group:
>
> https://forum.dlang.org/group/issues
>
> However, it mostly just contains automated emails about bugzilla issues, so most people don't pay much attention to it.

Well I know about that Group, but I think it is just a mirror or generated from the Bugzilla issues. What I'm proposing is different. Like going from Here (Forum) to There (Bugzilla), "iff" it was marked or reviewed by someone.

Matheus.
January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 01:13:05 UTC, matheus wrote:
>
> Well I know about that Group, but I think it is just a mirror or generated from the Bugzilla issues. What I'm proposing is different. Like going from Here (Forum) to There (Bugzilla), "iff" it was marked or reviewed by someone.

Should the D Language Foundation expect a donation from you to fund this position of "someone"? :)

If reporting bugs on issues.dlang.org is too difficult, then we should make it easier. Adding a second place to report bugs, and requiring "someone" to do a bunch of extra work to keep the two in sync, is just going to make the situation worse.
January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 02:16:41 UTC, Paul Backus wrote:
> On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 01:13:05 UTC, matheus wrote:
>>
>> Well I know about that Group, but I think it is just a mirror or generated from the Bugzilla issues. What I'm proposing is different. Like going from Here (Forum) to There (Bugzilla), "iff" it was marked or reviewed by someone.
>
> Should the D Language Foundation expect a donation from you to fund this position of "someone"? :)
>

Well looking over the Bugzilla, there is always "someone" checking and marking the issues as duplicated right? So there is always "someone" handling things anyway.

Now what I'm saying is NOT that "someone" here will have to analyze anything, just need to check if it's not a spam or some idiocy before the "BOT" collect the issue from the Forum to open there in the Bugzilla.

> If reporting bugs on issues.dlang.org is too difficult, then we should make it easier.

I didn't say it was difficult, but there is a hassle to open account that maybe be used only once just to help pointing some problem which members over here are requiring to help the language.

> Adding a second place to report bugs, and requiring "someone" to do a bunch of extra work to keep the two in sync, is just going to make the situation worse.

I think you misunderstood me, there is no second place. The forum would be a shortcut and the the extra work is just to make sure the issue is valid (Not a spam or some kind of joke). I'm pretty sure that even in the Bugzilla "someone" need to filter things over there.

Again there is no syncing, you open the bug in the Forum and "someone" do a glance over it and check if it's not a joke/spam and just marked to be created on the Bugzilla.

Interesting enough that you even pointed about the "sync" since there is the "Group Issue" where the Bugzilla issues are opened here as well, why not have the opposite?

Matheus.
January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 00:31:35 UTC, matheus wrote:

>
> Wouldn't be possible to have a new Group in this "Forum" called "Bugs"? So instead of new users need to create an account just to file a bug on bugzilla, It only would be needed to post there, and someone would look around and set that (Via automation of course) to open o bug report on bugzilla through that post. Since this forum is pretty much an e-mail server I think this wouldn't be difficult to handle.
>
> Why is that? There are a lot of developers asking for help testing their software, but every time is hassle to open different accounts in different places.
>
> I think this idea would be pretty neat and easy to contribute and we could visit the topic later to ask for updates.
>
> What do you think?

I'm not sure that would make anything better. We're looking into moving away from Bugzilla later this year and handling all of our issues on GitHub, so Bugzilla accounts will no longer be needed.

And we already have Razvan as PR/Issue manager. Part of his job is to triage new issues.  With a second person on the job to share the load, that should become more efficient.



January 19, 2022
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 09:52:43 UTC, forkit wrote:

>
> Well it's not that it 'might' stay there for 7 years, it's that it 'has' stayed there for 7 years:
>
> https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=14892
>
> I'd just be reporting the same thing... so not much point.

I thought you were talking about a new issue. In this case, you can add to the existing issue by leaving a comment about your use case. And then you can bring more attention to it by posting a link in the forums, as you now have done. And now H. S. Teoh has sumbitted a few PRs to fix it, most of which have already been merged. I've also emailed Razvan about it to make sure it's on his radar.

>
> My real point, is that -profile=gc seems like such a useful tool...how could it not get anyones attention, after 7 years??
>
> I presume nobody uses it, because they know about this issue ??

Who knows? Maybe people have used it and didn't notice or encounter the problem, or maybe people really aren't using it. Or maybe people encountered it and just did nothing about it. It doesn't matter, really. What matters is that circumstances have led to the issue remaining open for 7 years and you have now encountered it. So in that situation the choice is to do nothing, in which case it remains unfixed longer, or do something, in which case it may well get fixed.

Happily, you've done something (brought attention to it) and it is being fixed. Thanks :-)



January 19, 2022
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 03:11:26 UTC, Mike Parker wrote:
>
> Happily, you've done something (brought attention to it) and it is being fixed. Thanks :-)

Well, it really does seem like a very useful tool, so it does surprise me that nobody has paid attention to it for 7 years.

In any case, better to fix than wait till the million-more-D-users you wanting to attract, discover it ;-)

I'd also suggest it is categorised wrongly.

IMO it's not an enhancement. It's a bug.

After all.. its:

-profile=gc

not

-profile=gc_some_but_not_others

Happy that it's getting attention though .. much appreciated.