Re: [Caml-list] ambitious proposal: polymorphic arithmetics

["Sébastien Hinderer" <Sebastien.Hinderer@ens-lyon.org>]

Hi,

> So here it goes: why don't we have polymorphic +, -, etc. while we
> have polymorphic =, <, etc.?  Many novices and (at least) some experts
> feel that +., -., etc. are not quite nice.  Why not define +, -,
> etc. for as many types as possible such as integers, floating-point
> numbers, and tuples?  I think they can be implemented almost in the
> same efficient way as =.  They can also raise an exception if applied
> to unsupported values such as functions, just as = does.

By the way, why isn't it possible to detect this kind of errors at
compile-time ?
Isn't the type-system strong enough ?

> P.S. I believe I'm not proposing anything as serious as Haskell type
> classes.

I was wondering if it would be theoretically possible to have
Haskell-like type classes in Caml ?
If it is possible in theory, is it something Caml developers plan to
implement, one day ?

Thanks,
Sébastien.