syntax difference

[Jim Lee]

On 06/18/2018 07:03 AM, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> As a human programmer, you surely perform your own ad hoc type checking
> when you write and debug code.
Of course.  And, I use linting tools and other forms of static type 
checking.  What I don't like is adding the *syntax* for static type 
checking to the (dynamically typed) language proper, particularly when 
the implementations of said language do nothing but ignore it.

The syntax should be defined inside comments, by the tools that actually 
need to use them.  Let the tools do what they were designed to do.  Let 
the language do what it was designed to do.

If static type checking were a high priority, I would not choose a 
language like Python for the task - but some people seem to want to beat 
the language into submission as a do-everything-but-wash-my-car 
solution; and in so doing, the language becomes so fragile and bloated 
that people will walk away from it.

In reading through many of the PEPs, I'm reminded of the saying, "If all 
you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail".

-Jim