• Don Allen (19/19) Dec 23 2023 I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this
• type-level (5/24) Dec 23 2023 Absolutely. I even agree with the person whom you've quoted, but
• Richard (Rikki) Andrew Cattermole (10/29) Dec 23 2023 Agreed.
• Adam D Ruppe (91/92) Dec 24 2023 In the spirit of Christmas, let's spread holiday cheer and give
• Sergey (4/9) Dec 24 2023 Nice post, I would add also a couple of people
• M. M. (2/5) Dec 28 2023 Nice post. All the best for dlang in the coming year.
• Dibyendu Majumdar (6/10) Dec 24 2023 The D forums have a very high tolerance bar; as people would get
• Walter Bright (6/9) Dec 24 2023 I don't get people to do anything, they're all self-motivated.
• Dibyendu Majumdar (10/16) Dec 24 2023 I think you are being too modest; people don't just contribute to
• Walter Bright (9/13) Dec 26 2023 Proposals may fail for all kinds of reasons, but it's inevitable that th...
• Paul Backus (13/22) Dec 26 2023 The main thing I hear people complain about is not that their
• DrDread (9/28) Dec 24 2023 the problem is, all of this is not news. we've been at the exact
• Hors (8/17) Dec 25 2023 I really got tired from "agree with me or you are stupid". Some

Don Allen <donaldcallen gmail.com> writes:

I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this 
project, that it felt like a dysfunctional family. More recently, 
I said I saw hopeful signs. Then I read the "D is our last hope" 
thread.

It is discouraging to me that I feel that I need to lecture some 
of you about how to disagree. If you are an adult worthy of the 
term and are also a software development professional, I don't 
think it is too much to expect that the boundaries of good taste 
and polite behavior will be respected. I am not seeing that here. 
Calling the leader of the project a "stubborn fool" is just not 
the way to make your concerns known (I do not intend to point the 
finger at one person here; I am using this as an example of other 
posts that I think have crossed the taste/civility line). I have 
my own disagreements with some of Walter's decisions, but the 
fact is that without him, this project wouldn't exist. And if you 
don't like the way he runs it and can't convince him that you are 
correct, then you have options that would reflect far better on 
you than name-calling.

/Don Allen

type-level <type-level example.com> writes:

On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this 
 project, that it felt like a dysfunctional family. More 
 recently, I said I saw hopeful signs. Then I read the "D is our 
 last hope" thread.

 It is discouraging to me that I feel that I need to lecture 
 some of you about how to disagree. If you are an adult worthy 
 of the term and are also a software development professional, I 
 don't think it is too much to expect that the boundaries of 
 good taste and polite behavior will be respected. I am not 
 seeing that here. Calling the leader of the project a "stubborn 
 fool" is just not the way to make your concerns known (I do not 
 intend to point the finger at one person here; I am using this 
 as an example of other posts that I think have crossed the 
 taste/civility line). I have my own disagreements with some of 
 Walter's decisions, but the fact is that without him, this 
 project wouldn't exist. And if you don't like the way he runs 
 it and can't convince him that you are correct, then you have 
 options that would reflect far better on you than name-calling.

 /Don Allen

Absolutely. I even agree with the person whom you've quoted, but 
at the very least, elevated language is better used "behind 
closed doors." But at this point, as you imply, it's better to 
consult with other people and start the forking process.

"Richard (Rikki) Andrew Cattermole" <richard cattermole.co.nz> writes:

On 24/12/2023 9:17 AM, Don Allen wrote:
 I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this project, that 
 it felt like a dysfunctional family. More recently, I said I saw hopeful 
 signs. Then I read the "D is our last hope" thread.
 
 It is discouraging to me that I feel that I need to lecture some of you 
 about how to disagree. If you are an adult worthy of the term and are 
 also a software development professional, I don't think it is too much 
 to expect that the boundaries of good taste and polite behavior will be 
 respected. I am not seeing that here. Calling the leader of the project 
 a "stubborn fool" is just not the way to make your concerns known (I do 
 not intend to point the finger at one person here; I am using this as an 
 example of other posts that I think have crossed the taste/civility 
 line). I have my own disagreements with some of Walter's decisions, but 
 the fact is that without him, this project wouldn't exist. And if you 
 don't like the way he runs it and can't convince him that you are 
 correct, then you have options that would reflect far better on you than 
 name-calling.
 
 /Don Allen

Agreed.

A lot of vitriol was passed around.

Such negativity to that extreme, regardless of what people such as 
Walter has or hasn't done is very destructive.

It pushes people away, it does not grow the community it makes it 
significantly smaller.

It has to stop.

Clearly good faith has broken down, to the point people feel it is ok to 
black mail the DLF.

Adam D Ruppe <destructionator gmail.com> writes:

On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 the fact is that without him, this project wouldn't exist.

In the spirit of Christmas, let's spread holiday cheer and give 
thanks to the many people who made D what it is today.

Walter Bright, of course, wrote the first draft of the language 
and compiler, and lends his public credibility to the project. 
But, he is far from alone in making the project exist.

* * *

Without Andrei Alexandrescu, D certainly wouldn't look anything 
like it does now. Being the primary author of Phobos as it exists 
today (Phobos before Andrei was essentially recycled Javascript 3 
support modules and some thinly wrapped C bindings), Andrei has 
quite possibly had the greatest single influence on the timbre of 
D code.

Additionally, Andrei is the one primarily responsible for 
organizing the D Language Foundation and the various D 
scholarship programs that drive much of the internal development.

He also lent his pen to D, writing the book titled "The D 
Programming Language", laying out both a resource for learning D 
and a vision for its future, in a remarkably readable format.

I'm sure if I actually thought about this, the list could go on.

* * *

Don Clugston did significant work on D's math support and is 
notable for being the one who created CTFE.

* * *

Bill Baxter, Matthew Wilson, and a few others are influential in 
creating much of D metaprogramming as we know it today, including 
innovations such as `static if` and `mixin template`.

* * *

Timon Gehr, Jonathan Marler, Daniel Murphy, Kenji Hara, Sebastian 
Wilzbach, Mike Franklin, Benjamin Thaut, Michel Fortin, Jacob 
Carlborg, David Gileadi, and so many more have all left 
significant marks on the D language and compiler.

* * *

Jan Knepper and Brad Roberts are names we don't often see in 
copyright notices, but have been key figures behind the scenes 
running D's infrastructure. If not for their contributions, we 
would probably not have ever heard of D, as the website wouldn't 
work! Andrew Edwards deserves a callout for kickstarting off the 
recent series of DConfs.

* * *

David Friedman left his mark on D by starting the gdc project, 
producing the first fully, front to back, free software compiler 
for the D language.

Johannes Pfau and later, Iain Buclaw, would pick this up and 
bring serious credibility to D by leveraging gcc's broad target 
support and advanced optimization capabilities to keep it 
competitive with new upstarts, and the vast experience Iain 
Buclaw has brought to bear on D for the better part of 14 years 
now has kept it compatible with use cases the rest of the team 
didn't even know existed.

* * *

Tomas Lindquist Olsen and Christian Kamm are primarily 
responsible for kicking off the LDC project, later picked up by 
David Nadlinger (who added ARM support!), and now maintained by 
Martin Kinkelin.

Without their work, D quite possibly wouldn't work on modern 
Macs, Android phones, or WebAssembly.

* * *

Sean Kelly is primarily responsible for druntime as we know it 
today. If not for him, D would in all probability be 
significantly less capable than it is now, notably, it was his 
Fiber code that allowed Sönke Ludwig's work to get started.

Other notable names that come to mind in this area are Alex Rønne 
Petersen, Leandro Lucarella, Martin Nowak, Steven Schveighoffer.

* * *

Brad Anderson, Mike Wey, Christopher Miller, Lars Tandle 
Kyllingstad, Vladimir Panteleev, Mike Parker, Jonathan M. Davis, 
Ketmar Dark, Guillaume Piolat, many, many, many more in writing 
the libraries that make D what it is.

* * *

When it comes to the tooling support, Rainer Schuetze, Brian 
Schott, and Jan Jurzitza immediately come to mind, and I know 
there's others, there's a bit of recency bias in my memory.

* * *

Laeeth Isharc needs to get special mention for funding and 
organizing so much D-related work.

* * *

I'd call out Paul Backus, David Simcha, Dejan Lekic, Peter 
Alexander, JMD again, and so many others for new user support 
over the years, without whom who knows how many people wouldn't 
have stuck around past the initial hurdles.

* * * * *

And there's a *great* many I didn't mention here.

Of course, it is possible, even likely, that if many of these 
individuals weren't there, someone else would have done similar 
work. So maybe, just maybe, we can say that without them, the 
project would still exist.

But in the timeline we're living, these are the people who were 
actually there, who actually did do the work to make these things 
happen.


Ho ho ho. Merry Christmas.

Sergey <kornburn yandex.ru> writes:

On Sunday, 24 December 2023 at 14:36:20 UTC, Adam D Ruppe wrote:
 On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 the fact is that without him, this project wouldn't exist.

 In the spirit of Christmas, let's spread holiday cheer and give 
 thanks to the many people who made D what it is today.
 Ho ho ho. Merry Christmas.

Nice post, I would add also a couple of people
Ilya (Mir, asdf) and Adam (arsd)

Thanks for great libraries and Merry Christmas!

M. M. <matus email.cz> writes:

On Sunday, 24 December 2023 at 14:36:20 UTC, Adam D Ruppe wrote:
 In the spirit of Christmas, let's spread holiday cheer and 
 give...


 Ho ho ho. Merry Christmas.

Nice post. All the best for dlang in the coming year.

Dibyendu Majumdar <d.majumdar gmail.com> writes:

On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 Calling the leader of the project a "stubborn fool" is just not 
 the way to make your concerns known (I do not intend to point 
 the finger at one person here; I am using this as an example of 
 other posts that I think have crossed the taste/civility line).

The D forums have a very high tolerance bar; as people would get 
kicked out in other forums for the attacks we see here on Walter.

I am just an observer, and I always wonder how Walter has managed 
to get people to contribute so much to D; this is not easy in a 
non-commercial loosely managed opensource project.

Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> writes:

On 12/24/2023 6:57 AM, Dibyendu Majumdar wrote:
 I am just an observer, and I always wonder how Walter has managed to get
people 
 to contribute so much to D; this is not easy in a non-commercial loosely
managed 
 opensource project.

I don't get people to do anything, they're all self-motivated.

Though I do believe it is rare and remarkable that so many wonderful people
have 
generously given so much of their time and expertise. I am most grateful for 
their gifts to D, the DLF, and the D community. I regard the D community as a 
community of my dear friends.

Dibyendu Majumdar <d.majumdar gmail.com> writes:

On Sunday, 24 December 2023 at 17:23:12 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
 I don't get people to do anything, they're all self-motivated.

 Though I do believe it is rare and remarkable that so many 
 wonderful people have generously given so much of their time 
 and expertise. I am most grateful for their gifts to D, the 
 DLF, and the D community. I regard the D community as a 
 community of my dear friends.

I think you are being too modest; people don't just contribute to 
D because of self motivation; if this was generally true then 
every language project would get contributors easily.

Its a mystery to me, but I think that there needs to be an 
environment that encourages and creates that motivation, which 
you have managed to do. Part of this may be the exact opposite of 
what people claimed in the other thread; you have accepted 
contributions from people when they made sense; it requires good 
taste and great insight to see what contributions matter.

Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> writes:

On 12/24/2023 11:13 AM, Dibyendu Majumdar wrote:
 Part of 
 this may be the exact opposite of what people claimed in the other thread; you 
 have accepted contributions from people when they made sense; it requires good 
 taste and great insight to see what contributions matter.

Proposals may fail for all kinds of reasons, but it's inevitable that the
person 
behind every proposal feels it is best for D, and will be disappointed if it 
doesn't make it. I've proposed language improvements to other languages, and 
have had 100% of them rejected, and so know how it feels.

(Some of my proposals have reappeared submitted by others, and made it into the 
language!)

I know that it can appear as an unfair and unreasonable process. All I can say 
is we do the best we can with it.

Paul Backus <snarwin gmail.com> writes:

On Tuesday, 26 December 2023 at 18:03:12 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
 Proposals may fail for all kinds of reasons, but it's 
 inevitable that the person behind every proposal feels it is 
 best for D, and will be disappointed if it doesn't make it. 
 I've proposed language improvements to other languages, and 
 have had 100% of them rejected, and so know how it feels.

 (Some of my proposals have reappeared submitted by others, and 
 made it into the language!)

 I know that it can appear as an unfair and unreasonable 
 process. All I can say is we do the best we can with it.

The main thing I hear people complain about is not that their 
proposals are *rejected*, but that their proposals are (or appear 
to be) *ignored*.

When you put a bunch of work into a DIP or a PR, and then get 
"left on read" for weeks or months, it can feel like a slap in 
the face--like the project maintainers are saying, "we have so 
little respect for your work that it's not even worth our time to 
look at it." It can be a very discouraging experience.

It is inevitable that not all contributions can be accepted, but 
ideally, even the contributors whose work is ultimately rejected 
should come away from the process feeling as though they have 
been treated with respect.

DrDread <no no.no> writes:

On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this 
 project, that it felt like a dysfunctional family. More 
 recently, I said I saw hopeful signs. Then I read the "D is our 
 last hope" thread.

 It is discouraging to me that I feel that I need to lecture 
 some of you about how to disagree. If you are an adult worthy 
 of the term and are also a software development professional, I 
 don't think it is too much to expect that the boundaries of 
 good taste and polite behavior will be respected. I am not 
 seeing that here. Calling the leader of the project a "stubborn 
 fool" is just not the way to make your concerns known (I do not 
 intend to point the finger at one person here; I am using this 
 as an example of other posts that I think have crossed the 
 taste/civility line). I have my own disagreements with some of 
 Walter's decisions, but the fact is that without him, this 
 project wouldn't exist. And if you don't like the way he runs 
 it and can't convince him that you are correct, then you have 
 options that would reflect far better on you than name-calling.

 /Don Allen

the problem is, all of this is not news. we've been at the exact 
same point before and nothing is done to change it. D is still 
losing contributors because the guys in charge pretend the 
problem does not exist. D is losing contributors simply because 
their contributions are not getting the deserved consideration 
and attention.

see this thread for example: 
https://forum.dlang.org/post/ncbawciyybdksecurmsc forum.dlang.org

Hors <q q.com> writes:

On Saturday, 23 December 2023 at 20:17:29 UTC, Don Allen wrote:
 I have previously posted regarding my concerns about this
 [...]
 as an example of other posts that I think have crossed the 
 taste/civility line). I have my own disagreements with some of 
 Walter's decisions, but the fact is that without him, this 
 project wouldn't exist. And if you don't like the way he runs 
 it and can't convince him that you are correct, then you have 
 options that would reflect far better on you than name-calling.

 /Don Allen

I really got tired from "agree with me or you are stupid". Some 
people just can't take the fact others too can have opinions and 
they don't need to be the same with you. If they act like that, 
just ignore them and watch them quit forum.

Things can't happen without discussing. Discussion is needed for 
see the disadvantages of language and possibly fix it, and of 
course discussion is not just "accept my opinion".