On Mon, 12 Aug 2013 17:44:35 -0700 Walter Bright <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 8/12/2013 5:19 PM, H. S. Teoh wrote: > >> 5. Do we really want D to be restricted to only platforms that have > >> the latest Python up on them? > > > > I think that's a bit of hyperbole. It's the same as saying "do we > > want D to be restricted to only platforms that have g++/make > > installed?" > > No, I don't think it's hyperbole. I would bet that a C++ compiler > (which invariably come with a make) exists on essentially every > platform 32 bits or larger. Python? Doesn't seem likely. > Yea, while python is indeed hugely widespread, it still doesn't compete with C++/make in availability. There are people who deliberately avoid having scripting packages like python on certain systems for various legitimate reasons. Plus (and this is one of my primary beefs with Python), tools written in Python often have a tendency to expect a certain version of Python (or even certain lib dependencies), and it's up to the person *running* the program to make sure the script is given the right installation of Python. Woe is the user who gets it wrong, because they'll just be greeted with a big internal traceback. It's not like Java where you can install whatever runtimes you need and things will pretty much just run themselves on the correct version automatically, or tell you what expected version you're missing. (Not that I'm advocating make, either)
