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digitalmars.D - Object.print ... (again)

reply Kris <Kris_member pathlink.com> writes:
It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus that
Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or rather, noted
that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind Walter that it
still hasn't happened. 

Please; can we finally put this to bed? 

- Kris
Mar 10 2005
next sibling parent reply "Matthew" <admin stlsoft.dot.dot.dot.dot.org> writes:
Gets my vote

"Kris" <Kris_member pathlink.com> wrote in message 
news:d0qfc8$366$1 digitaldaemon.com...

 It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus 
 that
 Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or 
 rather, noted
 that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind 
 Walter that it
 still hasn't happened.

 Please; can we finally put this to bed?

 - Kris
Mar 10 2005
parent reply John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> writes:
mine also.

Matthew wrote:

 Gets my vote
 
 "Kris" <Kris_member pathlink.com> wrote in message 
 news:d0qfc8$366$1 digitaldaemon.com...
 

It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus 
that
Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or 
rather, noted
that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind 
Walter that it
still hasn't happened.

Please; can we finally put this to bed?

- Kris
Mar 10 2005
parent reply "Regan Heath" <regan netwin.co.nz> writes:
meee tooo :)

On Thu, 10 Mar 2005 14:41:50 -0800, John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> wrote:

 mine also.

 Matthew wrote:

 Gets my vote
  "Kris" <Kris_member pathlink.com> wrote in message  
 news:d0qfc8$366$1 digitaldaemon.com...


 It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus that
 Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or  
 rather, noted
 that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind  
 Walter that it
 still hasn't happened.

 Please; can we finally put this to bed?

 - Kris
Mar 13 2005
parent reply "Carlos Santander B." <csantander619 gmail.com> writes:
Regan Heath wrote:

 meee tooo :)
 
 On Thu, 10 Mar 2005 14:41:50 -0800, John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> wrote:
 

 mine also.

 Matthew wrote:


 Gets my vote
  "Kris" <Kris_member pathlink.com> wrote in message  
 news:d0qfc8$366$1 digitaldaemon.com...


 It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus that
 Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or  
 rather, noted
 that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind  
 Walter that it
 still hasn't happened.

 Please; can we finally put this to bed?

 - Kris






 


Maybe we're in a democracy, after all, and since I'm old enough to vote, 
I'll vote for this too.

_______________________
Carlos Santander Bernal
Mar 13 2005
parent reply John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> writes:
Carlos Santander B. wrote:


 
 Maybe we're in a democracy, after all, and since I'm old enough to vote, 
 I'll vote for this too.
 
 _______________________
 Carlos Santander Bernal


I highly doubt it.  I think "voting" just makes us feel like we're 
involved.
Mar 13 2005
parent reply =?ISO-8859-15?Q?Anders_F_Bj=F6rklund?= <afb algonet.se> writes:
John Reimer wrote:


 Maybe we're in a democracy, after all, and since I'm old enough to 
 vote, I'll vote for this too.


 
 I highly doubt it.  I think "voting" just makes us feel like we're 
 involved.


Oh, but you can be ? Why not just stop the "voting" and
provide the patch to remove Object.print from Phobos ?

The runtime library is Open Source, unlike the DMD compiler...
A working rewrite is probably more useful, than such a wish.

--anders

PS. Then again, Thomas already wrote a patch to remove usage
     of printf from the library but I haven't seen it applied ?
     (change "printf" into "writef", that was, in Phobos tests)
Mar 14 2005
parent reply John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> writes:
Anders F Björklund wrote:

 John Reimer wrote:
 

 Maybe we're in a democracy, after all, and since I'm old enough to 
 vote, I'll vote for this too.



 I highly doubt it.  I think "voting" just makes us feel like we're 
 involved.


 
 
 Oh, but you can be ? Why not just stop the "voting" and
 provide the patch to remove Object.print from Phobos ?
 
 The runtime library is Open Source, unlike the DMD compiler...
 A working rewrite is probably more useful, than such a wish.
 
 --anders
 
 PS. Then again, Thomas already wrote a patch to remove usage
     of printf from the library but I haven't seen it applied ?
     (change "printf" into "writef", that was, in Phobos tests)


Yes, my point is that nothing will be done unless Walter wants it done 
or has the time to get it done.  Submitted patches are a good idea only 
if they are guaranteed to make it into the update .  Otherwise they're a 
waste of time (I think).  At present there's no guarantee any 
contributions will make it in.  That's the way things work with D.  This 
system provides us with little motivation for participation in language 
and library improvement.

Naturally, the idea of voting has a nice feel to it, but in reality it 
doesn't really accomplish anything in this community.  This is not a 
democracy.  Voting is fun, though, and gives everybody that warm, fuzzy 
feeling about community involvement and camaraderie. Perhaps that's a 
good thing then? :-)

- JJR
Mar 14 2005
next sibling parent =?ISO-8859-15?Q?Anders_F_Bj=F6rklund?= <afb algonet.se> writes:
John Reimer wrote:


 Yes, my point is that nothing will be done unless Walter wants it done 
 or has the time to get it done.  Submitted patches are a good idea only 
 if they are guaranteed to make it into the update .  Otherwise they're a 
 waste of time (I think). 


However, I can still apply them to my own version of the library ?
(it runs several language patches that others find objectionable)

And since GDC *is* Open Source (even Free Software), I can even test
larger patches too - the ones out that affect the D compiler as well.

And to be honest, a fair share of bugs and fixes went straight in...
(not sure how Walter managed to sort out the relevant ones that quick)


 At present there's no guarantee any 
 contributions will make it in.  That's the way things work with D.  This 
 system provides us with little motivation for participation in language 
 and library improvement.


This is why it is nice that there is more than one compiler,
and more than one implementation of the standard D library.
It needs to be done from the same specification, so that
programs stay compatible between implementations thereof.

But with just a proprietary binary, there are no promises...
(I like DMD, though. My own *main* reason for GDC is Mac OS X)


 Naturally, the idea of voting has a nice feel to it, but in reality it 
 doesn't really accomplish anything in this community.  This is not a 
 democracy.  Voting is fun, though, and gives everybody that warm, fuzzy 
 feeling about community involvement and camaraderie. Perhaps that's a 
 good thing then? :-)


I think the idea of a PEP-like system wasn't all bad...
Some organized method of collecting wishes and requests,
and have a voting attached to see how others think about it.

Meanwhile, there's just the steaming old "Bazaar" of
newsgroups and wikis and personal web pages and rants. :-)
I guess that usually forms itself, under the Cathedrals ?

--anders
Mar 14 2005
prev sibling parent reply Ben Hinkle <Ben_member pathlink.com> writes:
 PS. Then again, Thomas already wrote a patch to remove usage
     of printf from the library but I haven't seen it applied ?
     (change "printf" into "writef", that was, in Phobos tests)


Yes, my point is that nothing will be done unless Walter wants it done 
or has the time to get it done.  Submitted patches are a good idea only 
if they are guaranteed to make it into the update .  Otherwise they're a 
waste of time (I think).  At present there's no guarantee any 
contributions will make it in.  That's the way things work with D.  This 
system provides us with little motivation for participation in language 
and library improvement.


I agree to a point. When I've sent Walter things for phobos he has responded and
we started an exchange about the proposed change. Some went in and some didn't.
I disagree that all patches should be guaranteed to make it into the update.
That would result in chaos. Submitting "arbitrary" patches is a waste of time.
If we knew more about what kinds of patches Walter will accept and how to
comminucate these changes to him it probably would make for more people
submitting patches. For example, Walter could say "all patches must be posted to
the newsgroup for discussion and in the email to me send the link to the
discussion so I can see how the community feels about it". Or "all patches must
have a backwards-compatiblity impact statement". I also think Walter doesn't
like patch files - he prefers entire modules that he can just drop in. I can
imagine he would ignore stuff like "just change foo in blah.d and see what
doesn't compile and change those calls to bar". Anyhow, I think there's plenty
more we can be doing to help Walter's through-put.
Mar 14 2005
parent reply John Reimer <brk_6502 yahoo.com> writes:
Ben Hinkle wrote:

PS. Then again, Thomas already wrote a patch to remove usage
    of printf from the library but I haven't seen it applied ?
    (change "printf" into "writef", that was, in Phobos tests)


Yes, my point is that nothing will be done unless Walter wants it done 
or has the time to get it done.  Submitted patches are a good idea only 
if they are guaranteed to make it into the update .  Otherwise they're a 
waste of time (I think).  At present there's no guarantee any 
contributions will make it in.  That's the way things work with D.  This 
system provides us with little motivation for participation in language 
and library improvement.


 
 
 I agree to a point. When I've sent Walter things for phobos he has responded
and
 we started an exchange about the proposed change. Some went in and some didn't.
 I disagree that all patches should be guaranteed to make it into the update.
 That would result in chaos. Submitting "arbitrary" patches is a waste of time.
 If we knew more about what kinds of patches Walter will accept and how to
 comminucate these changes to him it probably would make for more people
 submitting patches. For example, Walter could say "all patches must be posted
to
 the newsgroup for discussion and in the email to me send the link to the
 discussion so I can see how the community feels about it". Or "all patches must
 have a backwards-compatiblity impact statement". I also think Walter doesn't
 like patch files - he prefers entire modules that he can just drop in. I can
 imagine he would ignore stuff like "just change foo in blah.d and see what
 doesn't compile and change those calls to bar". Anyhow, I think there's plenty
 more we can be doing to help Walter's through-put.
 
 


Yes, you are correct in that regard. It wasn't my intention to suggest 
that he arbitrarily accept all patches.  I'm saying there is a problem 
with communication and organization, as ofted noted in the past.  After 
all these years, a system is still not in place to ease the patch 
submission process. As it currently stands, it's a "wait and see" thing 
with Walter.  That's got to dampen the motivation of even the toughest 
and most dedicated patch submitters... except for Anders, of course. ;-)

And the problem will continue and continue.  We'll go through that same 
old endless cycle of frustrated members asking why there's no bugzilla, 
why we can't help out if the language trully is open, why we have to 
wait for version releases to fix bugs, etc.  We'll continue to lose 
quality members as fast as we gain looky lu's and trollers.  We'll gain 
more people who are eager to offer D superficial praise after light 
evalution, and lose the critical thinkers that examine, stress, and 
critique the compiler into perfection.

Walter has a huge load with tons of backlog of fixes to be done. 
Between answering newsgroup posts, coding dmd fixes, improving his C++ 
compiler, and living his everyday life, I don't know how he manages.  I 
applaud him and thank him for all he's done so far.  D is certainly 
experiencing a surge in popularity and recognition; but I think 
something drastic has to be done with the system before this huge bubble 
bursts.  Suggestions have been made in the past only to fall on deaf 
ears.  Division of labor, delegation of tasks, and moderated discussion 
(ie open/closed committee) seem to be the way to go, if not now, at 
least eventually as the steam roll effect continues (post 1.0 perhaps; 
that 1.0 can be a stake in the ground for more than one purpose).  I 
strongly doubt the current system is going to continue to work.

-JJR
Mar 14 2005
parent =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Anders_F_Bj=F6rklund?= <afb algonet.se> writes:
John Reimer wrote:


 Yes, you are correct in that regard. It wasn't my intention to suggest 
 that he arbitrarily accept all patches.  I'm saying there is a problem 
 with communication and organization, as ofted noted in the past.  After 
 all these years, a system is still not in place to ease the patch 
 submission process.


This is true. Other projects that have much more activity are faster
in accepting (or rejecting) patches, because they have a much better
infra-structure set up with systems like bugzilla or cvs (/subversion)

For instance, all the Doxygen changes made for D are already online ?


 As it currently stands, it's a "wait and see" thing 
 with Walter.  That's got to dampen the motivation of even the toughest 
 and most dedicated patch submitters... except for Anders, of course. ;-)


I'm using a package manager, which let's me easily test out new patches
and also downgrade back to old releases should they not be working out.
Using patches also makes it easier to upgrade versions from upstream.

But of course, I am much more likely to work on GDC than on DMD...

--anders
Mar 14 2005
prev sibling parent J C Calvarese <jcc7 cox.net> writes:
Kris wrote:

 It's been a very long time (9 months?) since there was a concensus that
 Object.print was superfluous, and Walter agreed to remove it (or rather, noted
 that he "just had to find the time"). I'm posting this to remind Walter that it
 still hasn't happened. 
 
 Please; can we finally put this to bed? 
 
 - Kris


I still agree.

-- 
Justin (a/k/a jcc7)
http://jcc_7.tripod.com/d/
Mar 10 2005