From: "David Allsopp" <dra-news@metastack.com>
To: <caml-list@inria.fr>
Subject: RE: [Caml-list] Unsoundness is essential
Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2007 12:26:53 +0100 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <018201c80679$86a2ba00$017ca8c0@countertenor> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <1191461066.7542.48.camel@rosella.wigram>
> Ah, but that is what I *am* arguing for. The 'reasoning' is simply
> that 'the programmer knows best' -- when the type system doesn't.
"the programmer knows best" is one of the founding principles of BCPL!! I'm
not sure I agree, though - IMO Vincent is correct that being forced to
express things "properly" results in better code in the long run. Try
writing any substantial amount of BCPL[*]...
> The evidence is: programming languages with dynamic or unsound
> typing eg Python, C, are vastly more popular than those with
> strong typing.
I'm not at all convinced that dynamic/unsound typing is the reason for the
popularity of C, etc - I've never met a C programmer whose eyes didn't pop
out on stalks when you explain that Ocaml cannot reference a null pointer
(not that that has ever caused a Damascene-road conversion to the language,
either!). <joke> C and Python's popularity is more down to needing ever more
programmers to debug the work of the previous programmers, right? :o)
</joke> Personally, whenever I go back to C, the novelty of the relaxed type
system is instantly worn away on the first tricky-to-repeat core dump... at
least an Ocaml exception has a cat in hell's chance of being found
systematically!
David
* With apologies and due deference to Martin Richards if he reads this list!
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2007-10-04 11:28 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 41+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2007-10-03 8:35 Locally-polymorphic exceptions [was: folding over a file] oleg
2007-10-03 11:27 ` kirillkh
2007-10-03 11:48 ` [Caml-list] " Daniel de Rauglaudre
2007-10-03 12:19 ` kirillkh
2007-10-03 12:32 ` Daniel de Rauglaudre
2007-10-03 14:34 ` kirillkh
2007-10-03 20:39 ` Christophe Raffalli
2007-10-03 22:50 ` Unsoundness is essential skaller
2007-10-03 23:13 ` [Caml-list] " Jacques Carette
2007-10-04 1:24 ` skaller
2007-10-04 11:26 ` David Allsopp [this message]
2007-10-04 12:45 ` Vincent Hanquez
2007-10-04 15:07 ` skaller
2007-10-03 23:13 ` Vincent Aravantinos
2007-10-04 1:49 ` skaller
2007-10-03 23:28 ` Joshua D. Guttman
2007-10-04 1:52 ` skaller
2007-10-04 2:35 ` Brian Hurt
2007-10-04 7:46 ` Christophe Raffalli
2007-10-04 8:56 ` Arnaud Spiwack
2007-10-04 14:49 ` skaller
2007-10-04 15:00 ` Harrison, John R
2007-10-04 15:29 ` Andrej Bauer
2007-10-04 16:25 ` skaller
2007-10-04 18:17 ` Arnaud Spiwack
2007-10-04 20:54 ` skaller
2007-10-04 22:24 ` Arnaud Spiwack
2007-10-04 16:37 ` skaller
2007-10-04 18:59 ` Christophe Raffalli
2007-10-04 15:04 ` Andrej Bauer
2007-10-04 15:57 ` Christophe Raffalli
2007-10-04 16:03 ` skaller
2007-10-04 20:02 ` Ken Rose
2007-10-04 21:00 ` skaller
2007-10-04 15:31 ` Lukasz Stafiniak
2007-10-04 17:56 ` rossberg
2007-10-04 19:56 ` skaller
2007-10-04 21:07 ` rossberg
2007-10-04 22:23 ` skaller
2007-10-05 2:48 ` Bárður Árantsson
2007-10-04 2:16 ` Locally-polymorphic exceptions [was: folding over a file] oleg
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