Re: Questions for a language designer

[Stéphane Payrard <address@hidden>]

On Tue, May 27, 2003 at 01:16:12PM -0700, Steve Dekorte wrote:
> 
> On Tuesday, May 27, 2003, at 12:49 PM, Scott McKay wrote:
> > - Do you want a first-class object system?  Should it
> >   extend all the way to the primitive types, or do you
> >   want to special-case those like Java?
> 
> To I'd add:
> - do you want a class-based or prototype-based object model?
> - If the later, do you want a differential prototype-based model?
> 
> These are the questions I'd ask:
> - Are you in the OOP or non-OOP camp?
> - Are you in the static or dynamic typing camp?
> - How important is flexibility? How about speed?

The choice between static and dynamic typing is not an exclusive or.
Many times, when there are religious battles between polar opposites,
there is an opportunity for a continuum.

Perl6 will infer as much type as it can at compilation time and will
rely on dynamic typing otherwise. This means that a programmer can
start with flexibility and later commit to specific static types
when/where/if he needs speed and/or strict interfaces.  This will
complicate the implementation though.

--
  stef

> 
> Cheers,
> Steve
> "Statically typed languages are like American sports cars.
> They go fast, but only in a straight line"
>