Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!decwrl!sgi!shinobu!odin!odin.corp.sgi.com!nix From: nix@asd.sgi.com (Sold to the highest Buddha) Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: Re: Dynamic typing (part 3) Message-ID: Date: 2 May 91 22:16:54 GMT References: <2450@optima.cs.arizona.edu> Sender: news@odin.corp.sgi.com (Net News) Organization: Harlequin Necromances Lines: 22 In-Reply-To: stephen@estragon.uchicago.edu's message of 2 May 91 09:01:11 GMT stephen@estragon.uchicago.edu (Stephen P Spackman) writes: > DYNAMIC typing uses tags always ... unless the typing can be completely determined at compile time, and the tags can be optimized out. It seems to me that a language with a good type inference algorithm and optional type constraints provided by the programmer should be able to do this in many cases, eliminating type tags when they aren't necessary. If you're a static typing fan, you tell the compiler to whine at you if it can't optimize out all type tags at compile time, and you have to provide extra type information to get the code to compile. Is there any reason why this can't be done? Are there any "dynamically typed" languages that do this? Nix Thompson nix@sgi.com ...!uunet!sgi!nix follow the black valley - trail of death into the beautiful sunshine.