From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,d89b08801f2aacae X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2002-05-01 14:36:10 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: Brian.Gaffney@myrealbox.com (Brian Gaffney) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Is strong typing worth the cost? Date: 1 May 2002 14:36:09 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Message-ID: <5e9b8c34.0205011336.56a9e3b2@posting.google.com> References: <4519e058.0204290722.2189008@posting.google.com> <3CCE8523.6F2E721C@earthlink.net> <3CCEB246.9090009@worldnet.att.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: 67.216.57.176 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1020288970 22395 127.0.0.1 (1 May 2002 21:36:10 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 1 May 2002 21:36:10 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:23369 Date: 2002-05-01T21:36:10+00:00 List-Id: "Marin David Condic" wrote in message news:... > Experiments in software engineering could get very expensive. Maybe not as > expensive as high-energy particle physics, but pretty expensive. In order to > be meaningful, they would also need to be of sufficient size that they would > become very time consuming - making possible results rather dated. > > Consider that to test the hypothesis: "Strong Typing In A Language Improves > Productivity And Reduces Errors" you would need the following: > > 1) A set of requirements for a project that should result in software of . . . > 2) Two designs to those requirements that are as close to identical as . . . Perhaps this could be done using two different Win32 (or similiar) bindings. One team could be required to use a paper-thin (C) binding, and be provided with easy-to-access conversion routines (so type conversions could be done whenever desired). The other team could be given a thicker binding (same API routines, but using Ada types, type-distinct parameters, etc.). You could use the same requirements, basically the same design, and possibly even the same test suite. If the project were reasonably large with a sufficient percentage of the code dealing with the binding, the first team would basically be writing C code. The result could be a reasonable assessment (of something:-). Not saying it'd be a good idea, or a productive use of time, just an idea of how this could be done. I know I am a lot more productive after I've made a thicker binding to a library I'm trying to use.