July 05, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 08:15:53 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 7/5/2020 12:24 AM, 9il wrote:
>> On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 06:23:35 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>>> On 7/4/2020 8:09 PM, 9il wrote:
>>> Does the float parsing code require bignum?
>> Yes. The decimal float parsing requires big integer arithmetic and software
>
> Arbitrary precision or simply a fixed amount of more precision?

Up to 2^^16384 - 1.

July 05, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 08:15:53 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>
> It doesn't work quite like that. The D Language Foundation controls it. Andrei, Atila, and myself control it only as far as we DLF empowers us to, which can change. Official parts of the DMD distribution have to be controlled by the DLF. It's unworkable otherwise.

If I remember correctly some time ago DMD hasn't been even Boost licensed. Also, DMD uses C libraries at least. I can't see why adding an open-source Boost licensed dependency is unworkable then.

July 05, 2020
On 7/5/2020 1:56 AM, 9il wrote:
> On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 08:15:53 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>>
>> It doesn't work quite like that. The D Language Foundation controls it. Andrei, Atila, and myself control it only as far as we DLF empowers us to, which can change. Official parts of the DMD distribution have to be controlled by the DLF. It's unworkable otherwise.
> 
> If I remember correctly some time ago DMD hasn't been even Boost licensed. Also, DMD uses C libraries at least. I can't see why adding an open-source Boost licensed dependency is unworkable then.

All of DMD, Druntime, and Phobos use Boost, except for Curl and the zip library (which we probably shouldn't have added).
July 05, 2020
On 7/5/2020 3:35 AM, Walter Bright wrote:
> All of DMD, Druntime, and Phobos use Boost, except for Curl and the zip library (which we probably shouldn't have added).

Also, there are no dependencies on Curl and zip.

We don't distribute the C libraries, we use whatever is on the user's system.
July 05, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 10:39:49 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 7/5/2020 3:35 AM, Walter Bright wrote:
>> All of DMD, Druntime, and Phobos use Boost, except for Curl and the zip library (which we probably shouldn't have added).
>
> Also, there are no dependencies on Curl and zip.
>
> We don't distribute the C libraries, we use whatever is on the user's system.

DMD statically links the C standard library (and maybe something else).

There is no risk for DMD and DFL to depend on a Mir's Boost licensed library. If something happens with Mir or Mir change the license, DFL will be able to fork the required code at any point in the Boost licensed part of git history.

July 05, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 11:07:55 UTC, 9il wrote:
> There is no risk for DMD and DFL to depend on a Mir's Boost licensed library. If something happens with Mir or Mir change the license, DFL will be able to fork the required code at any point in the Boost licensed part of git history.

Can't speak for Walter or the D foundation here, but I'm not sure the concern is really about licensing.  It's about putting in place a required dependency on code where maintenance decisions are outside the hands of the D Foundation.
July 05, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 12:46:58 UTC, Joseph Rushton Wakeling wrote:
>
> Can't speak for Walter or the D foundation here, but I'm not sure the concern is really about licensing.  It's about putting in place a required dependency on code where maintenance decisions are outside the hands of the D Foundation.

It's a resource question again. I'm all for that for example D should have a native alternative to curl including SSL/TLS support. If someone is willing to invest the man hours into such project, I'm all for it. Nim went that way having partial native http support so it isn't impossible.
July 06, 2020
On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 14:29:22 UTC, IGotD- wrote:

> It's a resource question again. I'm all for that for example D should have a native alternative to curl including SSL/TLS support. If someone is willing to invest the man hours into such project, I'm all for it. Nim went that way having partial native http support so it isn't impossible.

I agree, that would be really nice. Unfortunately it's quite tricky if you want to integrate with the platform provided TLS implementation [1]. Unless you're suggesting to create a crypto library from scratch, which is a whole different beast, and probably a bad idea [2].

[1] https://forum.dlang.org/post/prsrbzoanxwytrtpyqgv@forum.dlang.org
[2] https://forum.dlang.org/post/hsmjcgxzujgwsiegikos@forum.dlang.org

--
/Jacob Carlborg

July 07, 2020
On 7/5/2020 5:46 AM, Joseph Rushton Wakeling wrote:
> On Sunday, 5 July 2020 at 11:07:55 UTC, 9il wrote:
>> There is no risk for DMD and DFL to depend on a Mir's Boost licensed library. If something happens with Mir or Mir change the license, DFL will be able to fork the required code at any point in the Boost licensed part of git history.
> 
> Can't speak for Walter or the D foundation here, but I'm not sure the concern is really about licensing.  It's about putting in place a required dependency on code where maintenance decisions are outside the hands of the D Foundation.

That's right, it's not about the licensing. It's that the DLF should control the code it distributes.

Businesses will not want to commit to a balkanized project.

The proposal is for Mir to become a central required component of DMD and Phobos. This means it needs to become part of the D Language Foundation.
July 07, 2020
On Tuesday, 7 July 2020 at 07:49:02 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> That's right, it's not about the licensing. It's that the DLF should control the code it distributes.
>
> Businesses will not want to commit to a balkanized project.
>

From a business point of view, having slightly more correct string to float conversion holds very little value. I'll stick with sscanf thanks...