From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from nez-perce.inria.fr (nez-perce.inria.fr [192.93.2.78]) by yquem.inria.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 294FCBCAE for ; Mon, 18 Jul 2005 21:40:45 +0200 (CEST) Received: from pih-relay04.plus.net (pih-relay04.plus.net [212.159.14.131]) by nez-perce.inria.fr (8.13.0/8.13.0) with ESMTP id j6IJeiLO024716 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO) for ; Mon, 18 Jul 2005 21:40:45 +0200 Received: from [80.229.56.224] (helo=chetara) by pih-relay04.plus.net with esmtp (Exim) id 1DubTn-0006AA-SH for caml-list@yquem.inria.fr; Mon, 18 Jul 2005 20:40:44 +0100 From: Jon Harrop Organization: Flying Frog Consultancy Ltd. To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] (Mostly) Functional Design? Date: Mon, 18 Jul 2005 20:38:44 +0100 User-Agent: KMail/1.7.2 References: <9cc3782b05071411004b27b6a4@mail.gmail.com> <42DB74DC.8030201@barettadeit.com> <42DBF1C6.7080005@cs.utah.edu> In-Reply-To: <42DBF1C6.7080005@cs.utah.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Message-Id: <200507182038.45032.jon@ffconsultancy.com> X-Miltered: at nez-perce with ID 42DC05BC.001 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail.ensmp.fr)! X-Spam: no; 0.00; caml-list:01 morelli:01 ocaml:01 ocaml:01 productive:01 haskell:01 statically:01 frog:98 presenta:98 wrote:01 typing:01 suited:01 checking:02 graphics:02 functional:02 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.0.2 (2004-11-16) on yquem.inria.fr X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.0 required=5.0 tests=none autolearn=disabled version=3.0.2 X-Spam-Level: On Monday 18 July 2005 19:15, Robert Morelli wrote: > With all due respect, claims of order of magnitude productivity > gains, that OCaml is a far better language than Java, etc. are > exactly the kind of advocacy that I think is counterproductive. > Most programmers would regard such dramatic statements as implausible, > if not preposterous. Although "preposterous", I agree that OCaml is an order of magnitude more productive than C++. I also agree that code maintainance is the main reason for this. > The use of type checking is a point where the FP community > has not reached consensus, as there are widely divergent views from > the Scheme community and the ML and Haskell communities. I have seen huge improvements in productivity only from statically typed languages. More importantly, I can do many things in OCaml which I could not have done in C++ because they were practically impossible. > In general, I believe that OCaml and its approach to static typing > are best suited to simple domains, like language tools and formal > methods. Firstly, those domains are not simple (quite the opposite, in fact!). Secondly, OCaml has already been applied with great success to many, wildly different problem domains. For example, we have found OCaml to be very beneficial in the areas of scientific computing and graphics. The fact that people like Alex and I are able to run our companies this is a testament to this fact. -- Dr Jon D Harrop, Flying Frog Consultancy Ltd. Technical Presentation Software http://www.ffconsultancy.com/products/presenta