Interview at Lang.NEXT

[Craig Dillabaugh via Digitalmars-d-announce]

On Wednesday, 4 June 2014 at 22:13:33 UTC, Ary Borenszweig wrote:
> On 6/4/14, 6:11 PM, Craig Dillabaugh wrote:
>> On Wednesday, 4 June 2014 at 20:10:51 UTC, Ary Borenszweig 
>> wrote:
>>> On 6/4/14, 3:33 PM, Craig Dillabaugh wrote:
>>>> On Wednesday, 4 June 2014 at 17:31:56 UTC, Ary Borenszweig 
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> On 6/4/14, 1:27 PM, Meta wrote:
>>>>>> On Wednesday, 4 June 2014 at 06:19:05 UTC, Andrei 
>>>>>> Alexandrescu wrote:
>>
>> clip
>>
>>>>
>>>> But using function templates and the like you can still get 
>>>> fairly
>>>> 'Python-like' code in D.  I find dealing with types to be 
>>>> one of the
>>>> areas that requires the 'least' amount of mental effort in 
>>>> software
>>>> development. I don't understand why people see 'untyped' 
>>>> languages as
>>>> simpler for the most part.
>>>
>>> I was actually talking about having to specify types 
>>> everywhere, like
>>> in function signatures, the fields of classes and structs, 
>>> etc.
>>>
>>> You can still have a language that feels dynamic but is 
>>> statically
>>> typed. The compiler catches type-related bugs for you, and 
>>> you can
>>> prototype something very fast. Then you can add type 
>>> annotations (if
>>> you want). I wouldn't say this language is 'untyped'.
>>>
>>> One such language is Julia.
>>
>> OK, but my point was that specifying the type (at least for 
>> me) takes an
>> insignificant amount of time (and is very useful months down 
>> the road
>> when I am looking at the code, trying to figure out what it is 
>> supposed
>> to do).
>>
>> When declaring a variable, in almost every case, figuring out 
>> the proper
>> type, and writing that type takes a fraction of a second.
>
> The problem comes when you need to refactor your code and swap 
> one type for another. You have to change all ocurrences of that 
> type in that situation for another.

For sure there are situations where each approach will have some
ease of implementation/maintenance advantages.

The main point I have been trying to make is that I don't 
personally think that static typing is any more mentally 
challenging than dynamic typing - in most instances.