Invisible wrote:
> Isn't that precisely what Smalltalk also does? :-P

Oddly enough, Ada can unload and reload new code while it's running too, and 
that's about the most anal-retentive language I've ever used.

> Of course, much as I like Smalltalk, the lack of static typing makes it 
> really hard to use. [...] but *good luck* figuring out where the 
 > _problem_ is. The
> call stack only shows you where the problem get _detected_.

You know, I did my PhD work by patching into someone else's structured 
editor/compiler/interpreter written Smalltalk, without really understanding 
all the details. I had this kind of error maybe a handful of times, and it 
was never confusing what happened. If you leave out a level of indirection, 
then you wind up with an array of XYZ where you expected a XYZ, so you know 
you missed the indirection where you wanted to go from array-of-XYZ to XYZ. 
If do one too many, you get the error exactly when you ask for the Nth XYZ 
from the array of XYZ that's really a single XYZ.

> As soon as you start trying to do anything more sophisticated than that, 
> scripting languages become inadaquate.

I disagree.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   The NFL should go international. I'd pay to
   see the Detroit Lions vs the Roman Catholics.

Post a reply to this message