It would be a great boon if there were a D interpreter where you just write some code to try out. The most obvious advantage I see is that it would become a lot easier to learn D, especially if it's one's first language.

Another advantage I see is that it possibly attracts more people towards D, which could further D's advance to become a mainstream language (which is one of D's goals, I presume). This perhaps in turn would provide more books written on D by people who know much about it, which would possibly attract even MORE people to D. Well, you get the basic point which is cause and effect.

If I had the skill, I'd start up such a project myself, but alas. So, I'm just throwing in the suggestion (which I think was suggested at least once before).

Brendan:
> It would be a great boon if there were a D interpreter where you just write some code to try out.

Recently someone has shown here a probably very nice exec module/system (I don't remember the name and author, sorry, someone else can help you), to execute D code dynamically. But despite looking cool I have not succeed making it work, and everyone seem to have ignored it. You can take that project and create what you want, it's not an interpreter, but maybe it's fast/good enough for interactive use, to learn D syntax, try snippets of code, etc (basically some of the things the Python/ Scheme / etc REPL are good for).
Note that lot of people coming from statically typed languages like C++ may ignore your words, because they don't understand why a REPL is so useful, so you have to teach/explain them carefully :-)

Bye,
bearophile

bearophile schrieb:
> Brendan:
>> It would be a great boon if there were a D interpreter where you just write some code to try out.
> 
> Recently someone has shown here a probably very nice exec module/system (I don't remember the name and author, sorry, someone else can help you), to execute D code dynamically. But despite looking cool I have not succeed making it work, and everyone seem to have ignored it. You can take that project and create what you want, it's not an interpreter, but maybe it's fast/good enough for interactive use, to learn D syntax, try snippets of code, etc (basically some of the things the Python/ Scheme / etc REPL are good for).
> Note that lot of people coming from statically typed languages like C++ may ignore your words, because they don't understand why a REPL is so useful, so you have to teach/explain them carefully :-)
> 
> Bye,
> bearophile

Burton Radons,
news://news.digitalmars.com:119/fp0af9$10jh$1@digitalmars.com

hth bjoern

bearophile wrote:
> Brendan:
>> It would be a great boon if there were a D interpreter where you just write some code to try out.
> 
> Recently someone has shown here a probably very nice exec module/system (I don't remember the name and author, sorry, someone else can help you),  to execute D code dynamically. But despite looking cool I have not 
succeed making it work, and everyone seem to have ignored it. You can take that project and create what you want, it's not an interpreter, but maybe it's fast/good enough for interactive use, to learn D syntax, try snippets of code, etc (basically some of the things the Python/ Scheme / etc REPL are good for).
> Note that lot of people coming from statically typed languages like C++ may ignore your words, because they don't understand why a REPL is so useful, so you have to teach/explain them carefully :-)
> 
> Bye,
> bearophile

I think I have misplaced that word 'interpreter' or maybe not. What I meant was an interactive environment, much like you have with 'ghci' for Haskell. So I guess that abbreviation you used, 'REPL', is more like it.

I can see why some would not care for such a thing, but I think they shouldn't be the aim at all if we're talking about usage of a D REPL. But they may be the aim if it's about the creation of one :) But certainly they would at least understand the advantage of one?

Brendan:
> But certainly they would at least understand the advantage of one?

Build it, and I think they will come :-)

If it becomes good enough then it may be integrated into the standard distribution of D compilers.

Bye,
bearophile

BLS wrote:
> bearophile schrieb:
>> Brendan:
>>> It would be a great boon if there were a D interpreter where you just write some code to try out.
>>
>> Recently someone has shown here a probably very nice exec module/system (I don't remember the name and author, sorry, someone else can help you), to execute D code dynamically. But despite looking cool I have not succeed making it work, and everyone seem to have ignored it. You can take that project and create what you want, it's not an interpreter, but maybe it's fast/good enough for interactive use, to learn D syntax, try snippets of code, etc (basically some of the things the Python/ Scheme / etc REPL are good for).
>> Note that lot of people coming from statically typed languages like C++ may ignore your words, because they don't understand why a REPL is so useful, so you have to teach/explain them carefully :-)
>>
>> Bye,
>> bearophile
> 
> Burton Radons,
> news://news.digitalmars.com:119/fp0af9$10jh$1@digitalmars.com
> 
> hth bjoern

I can't seem to access that.

bearophile wrote:
> Brendan:
>> But certainly they would at least understand the advantage of one?
> 
> Build it, and I think they will come :-)
> 
> If it becomes good enough then it may be integrated into the standard distribution of D compilers.
> 
> Bye,
> bearophile

I would certainly like to make one, but I'm just not a good enough programmer (programming is not my main field). I don't even have much of an idea of how to start or how to continue an existing D REPL project.

At the moment I'm translating a simple little C++ practice project I had to D, and improving it a bit, and while it doesn't give me much trouble, going beyond such a little project would be quite difficult for me. So you can see that I'm not that hardcore as some of you.