Rename `new*` routines on distributed domains/arrays to `create*`

[bradcray]

Our current convenience routines for making distributed domains/arrays (e.g., newBlockArr(), newBlockDom()) should be changed to use create() prefixes instead.

[not directly related to this issue, but: We should also review their interfaces for 2.0]

[ronawho]

Not that it matters too much, but I'm pretty sure the current routines are newBlockArr() / newBlockDom()

[bradcray]

D'oh! (I knew there was something I liked about their current names! :D )

Fixed now.

[ronawho]

FWIW I use newBlockDom()/newBlockArr() pretty regularly and they've never bothered me. I'm fine with create* if that's the prefix we've chosen for factory functions but wanted to note that the current ones don't offend me so I wouldn't personally change them except to unify.

That said, I was wondering if they actually need to be factory functions or if they could be initializers on the underlying types (which have the same name) and might look something like new BlockDom(1..10). I'm not sure if that would actually work since we don't just want to create the domain map classes, but also want to then privatize and maybe that's weird to put in the initializer?

[bradcray]

They don't actually bother me either, but my attempts to get us to use newBlah() rather than createBlah() have all failed, and they were called out explicitly in https://github.com/chapel-lang/chapel/issues/14291 which makes me think we need to unify them. The fact that they are used fairly frequently (e.g., Arkouda code, talk slides) that makes me think we should get on this before 2.0.

I also wish for better ways to create these, e.g. through initializers. For me that starts unravelling the sweater of "How user facing is the dmap type?", "Should we be using a keyword other than dmapped?", "How should a distribution value be shared across multiple arrays?" which would be very satisfying to tug at, but definitely has not been on anyone's agenda for 2.0. For me it's been one of those "Seems like it could definitely be much better/nicer, but do we have time to get to it?" types of issues. Maybe we can use this issue to sidle into it a bit...

[stonea]

Just to follow up from this after our module re-review meeting:

The current plan is to move these functions so they're methods on the BlockDist.Block and CyclicDist.Cyclic types and rename them to createDomain and createArray. Otherwise the interfaces will remain the same.

[bradcray]

@stonea: I think that https://github.com/chapel-lang/chapel/pull/21567 resolved this issue—do you agree?

[stonea]

Yes, this has been resolved, I'll close the issue.