Re: Command Languages Versus Programming Languages

On 2024-10-10, Rainer Weikusat <rweikusat@talktalk.net> wrote:

Muttley@DastartdlyHQ.org ignorantly rambled:

On Thu, 10 Oct 2024 16:09:49 +0100
Rainer Weikusat <rweikusat@talktalk.net> boring babbled:

Muttley@DastartdlyHQ.org writes:

Its syntax is also a horrific mess.

>
Which means precisely what?

>
Far too much pointless punctuation. An interpreter shouldn't need the vartype
signified by $ or @ once its defined, it should already know.

>
For the purpose of variable declaration, how's the interpeter going to

Interpreter? Perl has some kind of compiler in it, right?

Interpreters for typed languages are possible. The lexical environment
bidnings contain type info, so when the interpreter sees x, it resolves
it through the environment not only to a location/value, but to type
info.

know the type of a variable without being told about it? Obviously, not
at all.

But it's not exactly type, because $x means "scalar variable of any
type" whereas @x is an "array of any type".

That's quite useless for proper type checking and only causes noise,
due to having to be repeated.

Actually typed languages don't use sigils. How is that?

The type of a name is declared (or else inferred); references to that
name don't need to repeat that info.

--
TXR Programming Language: http://nongnu.org/txr
Cygnal: Cygwin Native Application Library: http://kylheku.com/cygnal
Mastodon: @Kazinator@mstdn.ca