From: Sean O'Dell <sean@...>
Date: 2003-11-20T06:08:30+09:00
Subject: Re: "stereotyping" (was: Re: Strong Typing (Re: Managing metadata about attribute types)

On Wednesday 19 November 2003 12:42 pm, Maik Schmidt wrote:
> Sean O'Dell wrote:
> > Because something of this nature should be built-in.  It's faster when
> > written in C
>
> Premature optimization is the root of all evil.

That doesn't follow at all.  That's a severe generalization.

>  > and doesn't have to be dynamically loaded via "require."
>
> Why should everybody pay for it?

Because that's where the hit should occur.  If you don't need it, don't use 
it.

> > I also don't
> > believe type checking is something that there should be competing
> > libraries for.
>
> Why? Monocultures are often a bad thing.

So where is the alternate implementation of the String class, or the Regexp 
class?

Something this big really ought to have a stamp of approval.  But that's a 
stretch; it doesn't look like Matz wants anything of this nature in Ruby 
anyway.

> > Also, respond_to? doesn't say anything about what a method does or what
> > parameters it takes.  Checking for an implemented interface declares all
> > of that.
>
> That's not true in any case. If checking for an implemented interface
> was sufficient, then the interface would have to look like a Java
> interface or something similar. The questionable feature that you are
> asking for implies IMHO a lot more changes than we all see now. And I
> cannot see a real benefit.

It requires NO CHANGES.  It's entirely optional.  It's just a declaration of 
an interface.

	Sean O'Dell