From: Robert Feldt <feldt@...>
Date: 2001-12-12T00:12:51+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:28227] Re: The benefits of dynamic typing?

On Tue, 11 Dec 2001, Michael Cook wrote:

> >> This post offers good coverage of all sides of the issue - could you post 
> >> it to the RubyDiscussions section of the wiki on Rubygarden.com?
> >> 
> > Ok, check out
> >
> > http://www.rubygarden.org/ruby?DynamicVsStaticTyping
> 
> it doesn't seem unreasonable that a language should support both
> static and dynamic typing.  then, if i knew at compile time what the
> types would be, i could tell the compiler, and i could possibly
> expose some problems at compile time.  but if i didn't know the
> types at compile time, that would be okay too.
> 
This is how Dylan does it. In RubyVM I've been thinking of allowing such
type hints either at compile time or when you write your methods.

Something like

class T
  type_hint Integer, :m, Integer, Integer
  def m(a,b)
    a+b
  end
end

when you write the method or if the type_hint above wasn't given in the
source it could be specified in a separate file and given to the
compiler.

Regards,

Robert Feldt