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by Greg Vaughn.
Original Post: Dynamic vs. Static Languages
Feed Title: Potential Differences
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Feed Description: Greg Vaughn on Agile methodologies, Java, OS X, whatever piques my interest!
A couple of months ago my mind went down this same path. I do believe that TDD compensates for many of the things static typing helps with. Over an IM conversation with Glenn Vanderburg, he came up with a good counter-point. The pointcut concept introduced by AOP is very powerful, and relies on static typing. I haven’t gotten my hands into AOP enough to be sure, but my impression is that it could be viewed as a compensation for the lack of meta-programming. Since weakly typed languages are more likely to offer meta facilities, this may be a moot point.
I’m glad to read the article to refresh this idea in my mind, because I think it may tie into the other direction my mind has been going lately (and I love those connections between ideas). I’ve recently began emphasizing the difference between the business logic classes, and the system infrastructure classes and how the different goals imply the different approaches we should use.
Now I’m confronted with the question: Is system infrastructure best with static typing, and business logic with weak typing?
I think I’ll start up a new background thread..
So, I’m not so sure dynamic languages will replace static ones, but I do think they’ll take some of the market where they are typically used. This also ties into my early entry about looking for languages that truly move the state of the art ahead. I will have the time to get more acquainted with Ruby by using it in a project in the next month or two. I’m excited.
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