If you have to go to this level, wouldn't it be better to have a language
for this? You probably wouldn't want this interactively, prototyping aside.

On Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 2:41 PM, John Stalker <stalker@maths.tcd.ie> wrote:

> > so I'm writing to get your opinions. maybe there are thing that people
> > implement themselves but want included in the shell itself? or just
> > something they want implemented?
>
> What I most often miss in shell programming is a proper type system.
> Bourne basically only has strings.  Rc improves matters slightly with
> lists of strings.  It's still not enough for me.  I make a lot of
> mistakes in shell programming and strict type checking would catch
> most of them.  I'm not sure I would use a strictly typed shell
> exclusively, but I would certainly like to have it available.
>
> --
> John Stalker
> School of Mathematics
> Trinity College Dublin
> tel +353 1 896 1983
> fax +353 1 896 2282
>
>


--
And in the "Only Prolog programmers will find this funny" department:

Q: How many Prolog programmers does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: No.
 -- Ovid

   "By cosmic rule, as day yields night, so winter summer, war peace, plenty
famine. All things change. Air penetrates the lump of myrrh, until the
joining bodies die and rise again in smoke called incense."

   "Men do not know how that which is drawn in different directions
harmonises with itself. The harmonious structure of the world depends upon
opposite tension like that of the bow and the lyre."

   "This universe, which is the same for all, has not been made by any god
or man, but it always has been, is, and will be an ever-living fire,
kindling itself by regular measures and going out by regular measures"
-- Heraclitus