From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Delivered-To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Received: from concorde.inria.fr (concorde.inria.fr [192.93.2.39]) by yquem.inria.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8926ABC75 for ; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:30 +0100 (CET) Received: from mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de (mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de [192.54.42.129]) by concorde.inria.fr (8.13.0/8.13.0) with ESMTP id j1E9dUWA025858 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=FAIL) for ; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:30 +0100 Received: from localhost (unknown [127.0.0.1]) by mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id E23F720029; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:29 +0100 (CET) Received: from mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with LMTP id 30594-01-84; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:27 +0100 (CET) Received: from mailhost.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (kaiser.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de [141.84.136.1]) by mail.physik.uni-muenchen.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id B83E32003E; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:27 +0100 (CET) Received: from eiger.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (eiger.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de [141.84.136.54]) by mailhost.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id 588FF26E87; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:27 +0100 (CET) Received: by eiger.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (Postfix, from userid 3092) id C80D73D96; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:16 +0100 (CET) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by eiger.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id C41C12D717; Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:16 +0100 (CET) Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:39:16 +0100 (CET) From: Thomas Fischbacher To: skaller Cc: Michael Walter , Daniel Heck , caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] The boon of static type checking In-Reply-To: <1108347745.2584.208.camel@pelican.wigram> Message-ID: References: <877e9a17050206221653d14456@mail.gmail.com> <877e9a17050212145737cc30d6@mail.gmail.com> <200502131451.02231.edgin@slingshot.co.nz> <20050213112630.73930e19@hobbes> <877e9a1705021312525337a907@mail.gmail.com> <877e9a1705021314512ff095b9@mail.gmail.com> <1108347745.2584.208.camel@pelican.wigram> X-BOFH: Daemons did it MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at physik.uni-muenchen.de X-Miltered: at concorde with ID 421071D2.000 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail.ensmp.fr)! X-Spam: no; 0.00; caml-list:01 wrote:01 wrote:01 syntax:01 syntax:01 compiler:01 cip:98 cip:98 lambda:01 lambda:01 lisp:01 lisp:01 checking:01 data:02 debian:02 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.0.2 (2004-11-16) on yquem.inria.fr X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.0 required=5.0 tests=none autolearn=disabled version=3.0.2 X-Spam-Level: On Mon, 14 Feb 2005, skaller wrote: > On Mon, 2005-02-14 at 10:59, Thomas Fischbacher wrote: > > > I must say, I did it, transliterating much of (it's not a lot of work > > to be done, yet not quite complete) C's syntax to lisp, with the > > intention to provide people with their own syntax which they even can > > extend, say, for new operators, should they feel like it. I know I > > probably will never use it. Neither will _any_ advanced lisp hacker, I > > suppose. But it should help some people if you build them a bridge. > > What else is a compiler but a bridge to assembler? A language is more than just syntax plus a rule how to translate that to machine code. One may come to such a conclusion by looking e.g. at C, but frequently, much more happens between syntax and machine code. Take the GC. Take fundamental data types. > > Just as one can learn more about the structure of the proton by probing it > > with electrons rather than with another proton, I would not mind a more > > systematic approach towards finding out what makes a good language and > > what not than throwing together a set of features from various corners, > > shaking it well, and seeing how pretty the thing one gets turns out to be. > > We're open to suggestions on how to do this, for surely > no one knows. All the maths in the world won't create a good > programming language, even though it may help weed out poor ones. Exactly. One of the greatest medical achievements was not the discovery of Penicillin, but the introduction of statistical methods and the double-blind experiment. Only this allowed us to do systematic studies of what's useful and what's not. No one has a clue how to systematically do a quantitative study of what makes a useful language. We even do not seem to be really interested in finding the appropriate questions to ask. -- regards, tf@cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de (o_ Thomas Fischbacher - http://www.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de/~tf //\ (lambda (n) ((lambda (p q r) (p p q r)) (lambda (g x y) V_/_ (if (= x 0) y (g g (- x 1) (* x y)))) n 1)) (Debian GNU)