It doesn't have good pattern matching or the borrow checker, but it does have much better metaprogramming than Rust. I think a lot of the metaprogramming used in the Python project could also be done basically as easily in D, which is a big accomplishment.
D won't get you hired (probably), but D is designed with hindsight from a C++ compiler writer and a C++ template wizard: It shows, D is objectively better than C++ is many ways. It's worth checking out, at the very least (It's also not hard to learn, so I say go for it)
An example of the power of D: The Pegged library for D can generate a parser, D code which gets compiled, directly from a grammar specification in a text file [inside a D program, e.g. mixin(Grammar("Your Grammar Here"))]
On the contrary. Many members of the D community have managed to leverage their D expertise into well-paying jobs. Many industrial D users recruit from the D community.
I was aware of that but I meant in comparison to (say) Java or JavaScript etc.
I was a former C++ full-time programmer (4 different jobs in high performance teams, high maintenance etc) and now I'm a D full-time programmer for 4 years.
It's easy to underestimate the difference, but to me _as a user_ those languages are night and day as an experience.
D is learnable, in the sense that your learning will have some sort of ending at one point. D is surprisingly stable too, the front-end doesn't change too much and all 3 compiler share the front-end. And it's somehow forgiving. So the whole experience is tilted towards what you do with it: you feel like "programming", not "programming in C++".
C++ has a few things going for it: it has some sort of mathematical completeness, you can find jobs maintaining C++ codebases for your retirement, and it has an aura of legitimacy. But overall I fear you would live in a much more complicated world, for reduced productivity.
D compiler can compile itself in under 5s (+ 10s for stdlib).