[article] Language Design Deal Breakers

[Timon Gehr]

On 05/26/2013 08:46 PM, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 5/26/2013 7:26 AM, Peter Alexander wrote:
>> A language that
>> statically enforces the programmer to check for null would help here.
>
> I'm not arguing it won't help. I've been working in the background on a
> NotNull!T template.
>
> I'm arguing that the benefits are being oversold.

IIRC the damage done by software bugs to US economy alone is estimated 
to be around 60 billion a year. One billion damage done by 
dereferenceable null pointers appears to be an optimistic estimate.

> It's like saying null pointers are the vast bulk of programming bugs.
> I just find that to be so obviously untrue.

Who is claiming this?

>
> Making non-nullable pointers is just plugging one hole in a cheese grater.

Yes. The next step will be to add dependent typing and the @correct 
attribute. :o)