Hey Cas! (and everyone)
My friend Ceranith found this language called D. Yes it is real :P… http://www.digitalmars.com/d
Ive seen u posting about Java’s lack of things like structs and not being able to release your j2ge thingy… well this language as me and Ceranith have discovered is practically C + Java. It looks pretty good to us… but we were looking for an opinion from someone else… it may also solve your problems as it appears to be fairly stable.
Check it out!
I lacks the development tools, and libraries that make Java great. And there is no Mac implementation.
I would rather use C++ with a garbage collection library. Though part of Java’s strength is that it DOESN’T have a lot of the low level stuff from C… I’m not sure how D compares in that regard.
i also noticed there was no mac port for it…
but still it looks good. its got practically everything java has and that C has…
take a look at the comparison chart
The chart is bogus. It contradicts other areas of the site. It also doesn’t account for Java 1.5 features.
It also assumes that the C++ standard libraries are not present which is a foolish assumption. (They argue that C++ still meets the C++ spec with out the standard libs. So what? That isn’t how anyone is actually going to USE C++.)
Like I said - there are some things from C that I don’t want. That argument is too shallow.
D is kinda neat imo. There is an ide for it on a site named ‘atari brothers’ or something (the d ide - too many d’s?) There are opengl, sdl and win32 libs available for it.
From what little I’ve played with it, yes it is alot like java, but its different enough so you can’t just jump in and code the way you might guess. Also, it becomes apparent how incredibly rich and diverse the java class libraries are when you don’t have have them.
Regardless, the future is managed, jit code; and d is not managed.
I did some reading on D a year or so ago, but didn’t get anywhere using it because the Linux impl never seemed to advance (and I could never get a compiled D program running without dumping core).
Wouldn’t want to bet my future on it. It’s neither open source, nor (I believe) developed by more than one person.
Kev
Yeah, I know all about D. I’ve played a couple of nice games written in D as well a7xpg and other ABA games).
There are many nice features in D. But for the same reason I didn’t invest heavily in BeOS I don’t think I’ll be investing braincells in D either.
Cas 
hmm well its interesting to see what u guys think of it…
ill show ceranith this thread when he comes on msn later 
…except it lacks most of the features that java added to C++, and lacks all the features that make me develop in java. It lacks all the key features of java.
It looks to me like “yet another attempt to make something similar to C without too many “daring features” which will save all the poor C/C++ developers who haven’t the courage or option to move to something more appropriate like java”.
[I’m thinking of python in particular, whose main purpose in the games industry seems to be as a way of letting C++ developers use advanced features of modern languages without losing face and/or without having to forego C++ entirely; it depresses me that most of the features in Python that C++ games developers rave about are either fundamental features of all modern languages since Java, or are just things you could have in C++ if only you had the courage to license the relevant library. I think there’s a *lot* of C++ developers who would be much happier people if they tried seriously switching to java…]
[quote]It also assumes that the C++ standard libraries are not present which is a foolish assumption. (They argue that C++ still meets the C++ spec with out the standard libs. So what? That isn’t how anyone is actually going to USE C++.)
[/quote]
Well, there is probably quite a large number of C++ developers who write code that way (think embedded), but your sentiment is on target. Anybody who’s considering D is probably using the C++ standard library.
God bless,
-Toby Reyelts