Fredrik Olsson wrote:
> Kyle Furlong skrev:
>> Fredrik Olsson wrote:
>>> Richard Koch skrev:
>>>> most horrifying was the lack of an integrated editor debugger thingy.
>>>>
>>>> as a user i think it is becoming at least deterring
>>>>
>>> What is wrong with Emacs and gdb?
>>>
>>> Why not try out Walters own debugger tips at:
>>> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/windbg.html
>>> I am quite sure that if it is good enough for Walter, it is good enough for you and me.
>>
>> Absolutely false. In the context he is speaking of, managers are looking for tools that will enable RAD. D is certainly not capable of calling itself a RAD language. (For the language novice) With C#, most any competent programmer who has never seen the language before can sit down at the IDE and bang out an app in a day, with little hassle.
> 
> And who says D is a RAD language? The website in it's very first paragraph says: "D is a systems programming language". With the exception of the news archives I can not find a single hit on RAD on www.digitalmars.com/d.
> 
> So obviously if what someone wants is a RAD tool for writing UI-apps, then D is not the right tool, nor does the author claim so. It does not mean that D is any less good at solving the problem domain it do targets.
> 
> 
> And I see that as a strength of D, not being tightly coupled with an IDE. C# is tightly coupled with Visual Studio, and is pretty useless without it. You can make it work, but well then it is no longer easy and "trouble free". A language do not need that property o be successful, and excel in it's field.
> 
> Java works pretty much every where, lots of IDE:s available, none required. Needing and IDE to get started is not an requirement for success or adoption; Perl, PHP, Python, C/C++, and countless others do just fine.
> 
> In fact the majority of languages get IDE-support because they are popular, they do not get popular because they have IDE-support.
> 
> 
> // Fredrik Olsson

"I am quite sure that if it is good enough for Walter, it is good enough for you and me."

Was your assertion, which I was disputing. I never claimed that D was a RAD language, in fact, quite the opposite.

The OP was about the failure of D as a good fit for the poster's project. I was merely pointing out that "good enough" obviously wasn't good enough in this case.

Kyle Furlong skrev:
<snip>
> The OP was about the failure of D as a good fit for the poster's project. I was merely pointing out that "good enough" obviously wasn't good enough in this case.

And my points are that
1. Emacs (or any other text editor) and gdb (or any other debugger) is
   more than good enough. Even a bonus, as tight integration with a
   "standard tool" would ruin it for users without access to the "right
   standard tool".
2. Richard Koch was well aware of the lack of:
   * "Visual Studio"-like integrated tools.
   * GUI-libs, with design tools.
   * No 1.0 release.
3. An "Visual Studio"-like tool is not required for a language to be
   accessible to beginners, or for a language to become popular.

Childish to complain about that 4 months later, even stupid to waste that much time when it should have been obvious it was not what he wanted from the start.


I have no clue what he means by "usable libs, extensions and standard algos". There are many, many resources for grabbing and reusing existing code for D out there, for a wide variety of purposes. And I find them usable, and when I don't I write my own.


I would never come up with the idea to make an application with a graphical user interface using D today. So for those apps I choose another tools. I would be willing to invest some time fixing that deficiency if I saw a suggested solution I liked, writing a new GUI-lib is a huge task, and unless the involved love and believe in the idea 110% the effort is wasted. Plus anything that is not platform independent is not interesting at all for me, and unless it takes advantage of the features of D, why waste the effort?
For the time being I use D for what I know it is good at: command line tools and server software without user integration.


// Fredrik Olsson

Fredrik Olsson wrote:
> Kyle Furlong skrev:
> <snip>
>> The OP was about the failure of D as a good fit for the poster's project. I was merely pointing out that "good enough" obviously wasn't good enough in this case.
> 
> And my points are that
> 1. Emacs (or any other text editor) and gdb (or any other debugger) is
>    more than good enough. Even a bonus, as tight integration with a
>    "standard tool" would ruin it for users without access to the "right
>    standard tool".
> 2. Richard Koch was well aware of the lack of:
>    * "Visual Studio"-like integrated tools.
>    * GUI-libs, with design tools.
>    * No 1.0 release.
> 3. An "Visual Studio"-like tool is not required for a language to be
>    accessible to beginners, or for a language to become popular.
> 
> Childish to complain about that 4 months later, even stupid to waste that much time when it should have been obvious it was not what he wanted from the start.
> 
> 
> I have no clue what he means by "usable libs, extensions and standard algos". There are many, many resources for grabbing and reusing existing code for D out there, for a wide variety of purposes. And I find them usable, and when I don't I write my own.
> 
> 
> I would never come up with the idea to make an application with a graphical user interface using D today. So for those apps I choose another tools. I would be willing to invest some time fixing that deficiency if I saw a suggested solution I liked, writing a new GUI-lib is a huge task, and unless the involved love and believe in the idea 110% the effort is wasted. Plus anything that is not platform independent is not interesting at all for me, and unless it takes advantage of the features of D, why waste the effort?
> For the time being I use D for what I know it is good at: command line tools and server software without user integration.
> 
> 
> // Fredrik Olsson

Like I said, people have disparate ideas of "good enough." If you are content with no IDE project management, with using command line tools, and manual debugging, thats fine for you. But many, many people out there enjoy the ease of development that niceties like Visual Studio give. I realize that many of you come from a C++ background, and this might be the norm, but in the Java/C# world people dismiss D for the lack of these things. So if D is trying to woo that crowd, just throwing your hands in the air and saying "ITS GOOD ENOUGH!" is NOT good enough.

Like you said, I think its a case of the right tool for the right job. At this time, D is not suitable for anything other than code that doesn't interface with anything but a command line, i.e. it is more of a systems language. However I do think that D /should/ also be an application programming language, and it should be easy. I hit performance bottlenecks all the time in my C# apps, and I would love to be able to redesign them in D. At this time though, its not worth the effort.

Maybe I was wrong in thinking that D was headed in this direction, and all Walter wanted was an easier C for writing robust OO operating systems and drivers and libraries, web servers and infrastructure apps. But if that is the case, I'm out of here, because that's not what I do.

Kyle Furlong wrote:
> Like I said, people have disparate ideas of "good enough." If you are content with no IDE project management, with using command line tools, and manual debugging, thats fine for you. But many, many people out there enjoy the ease of development that niceties like Visual Studio give. I realize that many of you come from a C++ background, and this might be the norm, but in the Java/C# world people dismiss D for the lack of these things.

That's true.

> So if D is trying to woo that crowd, just throwing your hands in the air and saying "ITS GOOD ENOUGH!" is NOT good enough.

Yes.

> Like you said, I think its a case of the right tool for the right job. At this time, D is not suitable for anything other than code that doesn't interface with anything but a command line, i.e. it is more of a systems language. However I do think that D /should/ also be an application programming language, and it should be easy. I hit performance bottlenecks all the time in my C# apps, and I would love to be able to redesign them in D. At this time though, its not worth the effort.
> 
> Maybe I was wrong in thinking that D was headed in this direction, and all Walter wanted was an easier C for writing robust OO operating systems and drivers and libraries, web servers and infrastructure apps. But if that is the case, I'm out of here, because that's not what I do.

I don't see any problem with D as an app language. I don't find IDE's to be useful. But it is pointless denying that others do find them useful, and it is obvious that the lack of an IDE has held D back. If anyone wants to do an IDE for D, I am very much in favor of the project.

"Walter Bright" <newshound@digitalmars.com> wrote in message news:ehbqcr$1e8$1@digitaldaemon.com...
> Kyle Furlong wrote:
>> Like I said, people have disparate ideas of "good enough." If you are content with no IDE project management, with using command line tools, and manual debugging, thats fine for you. But many, many people out there enjoy the ease of development that niceties like Visual Studio give. I realize that many of you come from a C++ background, and this might be the norm, but in the Java/C# world people dismiss D for the lack of these things.
>
> That's true.
>
>> So if D is trying to woo that crowd, just throwing your hands in the air and saying "ITS GOOD ENOUGH!" is NOT good enough.
>
> Yes.
>
>> Like you said, I think its a case of the right tool for the right job. At this time, D is not suitable for anything other than code that doesn't interface with anything but a command line, i.e. it is more of a systems language. However I do think that D /should/ also be an application programming language, and it should be easy. I hit performance bottlenecks all the time in my C# apps, and I would love to be able to redesign them in D. At this time though, its not worth the effort.
>>
>> Maybe I was wrong in thinking that D was headed in this direction, and all Walter wanted was an easier C for writing robust OO operating systems and drivers and libraries, web servers and infrastructure apps. But if that is the case, I'm out of here, because that's not what I do.
>
> I don't see any problem with D as an app language. I don't find IDE's to be useful. But it is pointless denying that others do find them useful, and it is obvious that the lack of an IDE has held D back. If anyone wants to do an IDE for D, I am very much in favor of the project.

I'm using VS .NET 2005 with the vsplugind found on dsource. I find it works quite well. I can even use the built-in VS debugger (although breakpoints don't seem to work, but asm{int 3;} takes care of that).

L.

Walter wrote:
> I don't see any problem with D as an app language. ....

On the D site, front page, it says:
"D is a systems programming language. Its focus is on combining
the ... "

Don't you think it should say something like:
"D is a general purpose programming language which can also be
used for systems programming language. Its focus is on combining
the ... "

or atleast:

"D is a systems programming language but can also be used for general purpose. Its focus is on combining the ..."


Or, is it really true that D can only do systems programming ?

- ns

Richard Koch wrote:
> tried to get d as the language of choice (daring) for a card projrct. it took almost 4 month with my ordering, threatening and ...
> 
> things died because of
> 
> 1.) no gui lib with builder

Which platform are you developing for?

For Windows, look at SDWF.  It doesn't need its own builder, because it's designed to work with Windows resources.  So you can design your dialogs, menus, etc. in a Windows resource editor.

http://pr.stewartsplace.org.uk/d/sdwf/

> 2.) any other language had usable libs, extensions and standard algos

What do you mean by this?

> 3.) competing standard libraries

D has only one _standard_ library.  What are you talking about?

> 4.) no foreseeable releases (such as 1.0)

Languages are seldom born ready for 1.0.

> most horrifying was the lack of an integrated editor debugger thingy.
<snip>

Give it chance.

Stewart.

-- 
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My e-mail is valid but not my primary mailbox.  Please keep replies on the 'group where everyone may benefit.

Walter Bright wrote:
> 
> I don't see any problem with D as an app language. I don't find IDE's to be useful. But it is pointless denying that others do find them useful, and it is obvious that the lack of an IDE has held D back. If anyone wants to do an IDE for D, I am very much in favor of the project.

I have heard VS described as "just a really good auto-complete". I get by just fine without it, but then again, I rarely use any libs I'm not used to.

BCS wrote:
> Walter Bright wrote:
>>
>> I don't see any problem with D as an app language. I don't find IDE's to be useful. But it is pointless denying that others do find them useful, and it is obvious that the lack of an IDE has held D back. If anyone wants to do an IDE for D, I am very much in favor of the project.
> 
> I have heard VS described as "just a really good auto-complete". I get by just fine without it, but then again, I rarely use any libs I'm not used to.

Also really good TAGS type functionality.  Alt-G on anything and it takes you to where it was defined.  At least with the VisualAssist add-in.  It's been a while since I've used Visual Studio without it.

--bb

== Quote from Bill Baxter (dnewsgroup@billbaxter.com)'s article

> Also really good TAGS type functionality.  Alt-G on anything and it takes you to where it was defined.

FWIW the code changes I made to the Exuberant Ctags utility to allow it to support the D language can be found here:

   http://www.zeusedit.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=613

With these changes it should be possible to achieve this Alt-G functionality with any ctags aware editor.