Bootstrapping a Type System (2010)

http://journal.stuffwithstuff.com/2010/10/29/bootstrapping-a-type-system/

by lemming • 9 years ago

101 22 9 years ago

journal.stuffwithstuff.com

osd• 9 years ago

I've read a few of this guys blog posts and they are generally fairly interesting. This one a little less so, but I had a good chuckle from the line about why he implemented generics in magpie. "Magpie has generics because I’m firmly of the opinion that a type system without generics is about as useful as a language with functions but no parameters." Let the go programmers pour hate upon this blog post

mrkgnao• 9 years ago

You can obviously write a code generator for all the functions you need once you write an AI good enough: by eliminating extraneous features like generics, Go leaves you free to actually solve problems that matter.

(/s)

Edit: I won't speak about the obvious, but anyone going back in my post history and concluding "Haskell Evangelism Strikeforce with an axe to grind" with a smirk is probably mistaken. There are well-designed languages whose goals may not perfectly align with mine (hello C/Elm/Clojure) and then there are some whose confusing inconsistency of design is, well ... confusing.

killin_dan• 9 years ago

Funny enough, I think you've actually hit the nail on hm the head about what makes go programmers so irritating, that they think the go spec has somehow taken into account "the right way" for every possible problem. It's so obnoxious.

Problems that actually matter is such a good indicator that someone has no idea what they're talking about.

Formalization and proofing is what MATTERS. If you ain't got that, you're basically just guessing

andrewchambers2• 9 years ago

Well when his language generates revenue we can discuss usefulness in objective terms, until then it lacks any real bite.

abiox2• 9 years ago

what is the relation between "language generates revenue" and "usefulness in objective terms"?

is the latter necessarily dependent on the former?

geodel• 9 years ago

I think it is other way around. It is non-Go programmers who would pour hate on lack of generics in Go every time. It is irrespective of whether Go is even referred in blog post or not.

sargun• 9 years ago

For those of you don't know, Bob Nystrom is the developer of Wren (wren.io), and previous to it he developed Magpie (the language he's discussing), and Finch (http://finch.stuffwithstuff.com/). He's pretty impressive as far as language development goes.

munificent• 9 years ago

I don't know about impressive, but I'm definitely profuse. :)

vanderZwan• 9 years ago

He also wrote the excellent Game Programming Patterns, which you can read here:

http://gameprogrammingpatterns.com/

yuchi• 9 years ago

I followed this blog for a long time. The whole journey of creating the Magpie language is fantastic. Most of what I know as a senior dev comes from trying to really understand his posts.

Bootstrapping a Type System (2010)

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