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From: davies@uiuccsb.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: Whats wrong with strong typing - (nf)
Message-ID: <4536@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 15-Dec-83 22:31:57 EST
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.4536
Posted: Thu Dec 15 22:31:57 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Dec-83 03:07:21 EST
Lines: 20

#R:yale-com:-258200:uiuccsb:8900001:000:1107
uiuccsb!davies    Dec 15 18:08:00 1983

If you don't believe that automatic typing of variables doesn't cause errors,
then you must not have written any large Fortran programs.  The first thing
I look for when a program is behaving strangely is whether I forgot to declare
a variable, and it defaulted to the wrong type.  Some Fortran 77 compilers
(including Unix F77) have IMPLICIT UNDEFINED which requires explicit typing
of all variables.  I consider this to be quite a useful feature, which was
unfortunately left out of the ANSI 77 standard.

The company I work for has implemented a compiler that uses the suggestion
of sending the listing produced by the compiler back in as input.  Error and
other messages are marked in a way that causes the compiler to ignore them
the next time.  This allows editing of the listing to correct syntax errors,
which is very convenient.
By the way, we also have the options RECURSE and NORECURSE for procedures etc.
NORECURSE produces more efficient code in some cases.  This may seem an archaic
feature, but we are using this language to implement a large program and have
added it for practical reasons.