A few thoughts not entirely random but without a well thought out storyline, prompted by a couple of recent threads here.
I like the comment from DConf that D should be the successor to Vala for writing GObject-based code. We have GtkD and in it GStreamer. Writing programs in C with them is a real pain in the a### and using C++ is only a little bit better. Having a number of exemplar applications showing how good D is for this sort of application would be a big win. I have been steeling myself to rewrite Me TV in D for two years, but there is always another problem that means leaving it in C++ is easier. GObject code requires RAII and C does not provide it. And the C++ wrappers do a poor job because of all the dynamic runtime behaviour the C++ wrapper model badly. D should be able to cover this ground easily. My biggest problem of the moment is libdvbv5 and librtlsdr. DStep seemingly cannot help as yet, and wrapping manually is a pain, and there is no GIR files for these. Thus D is a non starter whereas C++ can just use the C header files. This inability to get past the inertia is a huge barrier. Seriously, I end up with C++ because the manual wrapping hill is too steep. And… if the application is written in C++ or C there might be others willing to join in. As soon as the application is written in D, there appears to be no audience of people willing to get stuck in to help evolve the application. So here is the real barrier: writing GtkD/GStreamerD applications is less attractive because everyone in the universe expects such applications to be written in C or C++. Each person trying to reach over the barrier tends to be an island to themselves as no-one else seems to give a #### about the problem that person is interested in. The isolation of the people trying to get D some traction is arguably the biggest barrier to traction for D. It's the "no-one does it because no-one does it" problem. If everyone in the D community got interested in and just supplied moral support and advice for everyone else, even though the application was uninteresting, there might be the possibility of serious traction. Which then becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. In the mean time the Rust community are trying all of this sort of marketing to try and prove to themselves they are actually relevant and not a small clique. OK so they have some financial support, but maybe that can be got round in the D community. -- Russel. ============================================================================= Dr Russel Winder t: +44 20 7585 2200 voip: sip:[email protected] 41 Buckmaster Road m: +44 7770 465 077 xmpp: [email protected] London SW11 1EN, UK w: www.russel.org.uk skype: russel_winder
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