Python vs .Net

[Jive Dadson]

Bjorn Pettersen wrote:

> > From: Greg Brunet [mailto:gbrunet at nospamsempersoft.com]
> >
> > "Peter Hansen" <peter at engcorp.com> wrote in message
> > news:3E197F7C.D4549EC5 at engcorp.com...
> > > Greg Brunet wrote:
> > > >
> > > > - VB.NET (as well as C##) are/can be very strongly statically
> > > > typed - even more so than VB6.  I'm still trying to determine
> > > > if I like a strongly _dynamically_ typed language like Python.
> > > > I'm having a hard time understanding why it's not better to
> > > > know at compile time that ['foo' + 5] is an exception.
> > > > If I have to wait until runtime, then I
> > > > would think that I need to be writing LOTS more error
> > > > checking code at all my function entry points, whereas with
> > > > strong static typing, I can catch all this at compile time.
> > >
> > > While the specific example you quote, where two statically defined
> > > *constants* are being added, *could* be caught by the compiler, it's
>
> > > pretty rare to be doing that anyway.  More likely you would
> > > be doing something like ['foo' + bar] where bar is bound to the 5.
> > > That would not be catchable until runtime, by definition.
> >
> > Actually, it is catchable at compile time with a statically
> > typed lanugage.  If I have: '============== Dim sName as
> > String Dim nNumber as Integer Dim sResult as String
>
> I think you're missing the point of dynamic typing. In a dynamically
> typed language I can write a function, add, like:
>
>   def add(a,b):
>       return a + b
>
> the result is to create a function that can operate on _any_ type of
> objects that support the '+' operator. There is usually a strong urge
> from programmers coming from statically typed languages to want to add
> type information to this function or add run-time checks to ensure
> they're only passed the right kind of data. In a dynamically typed
> language this is at best counter productive and at worst simply wrong.
> The problem, in my opinion, is that these programmers can't write such a
> function in the languages they know so they're not thinking of problem
> solving in terms of generic functions. (Languages with advanced type
> systems, mostly functional langages, can determine the most generic type
> for these functions although I wouldn't expect many C++ programmers to
> know that <wink>).

Yeah, that's just the sort of blinkered, philistine pig ignorance I've come
to expect from those non-creative C++ programmers.

Nevertheless, in C++ there is a mechanism that is specifically designed to
facilitate generic programming while maintaining strong typing, namely
templates.
Check out the C++ standard template library.  Also look into the work done
by the BOOST group.

J.