tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post3002734981396805487..comments2024-01-16T14:32:49.175+00:00Comments on Arcane Sentiment: A brief history of “type”Arcane Sentimenthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04144052171693893368noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post-50737015434102873782017-12-10T17:15:08.675+00:002017-12-10T17:15:08.675+00:00I seem to remember a bunch of stuff around types a...I seem to remember a bunch of stuff around types and structs (records?) in this:<br /><br />https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1243380<br /><br />Published in 72, but maybe it has references.Vegardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04821963505711884515noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post-7433489014642697422017-05-24T13:34:28.158+00:002017-05-24T13:34:28.158+00:00Simula, in the late 60s?, is worth a look. Simula, in the late 60s?, is worth a look. exuberancehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02180872922559635562noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post-58944862120783682292015-02-03T08:22:44.310+00:002015-02-03T08:22:44.310+00:00Where did we first encounter the type we now call ...Where did we first encounter the type we now call 'String'? <br /><br />Once upon a time, arrays of numbers representing ASCII (or EBDIC) characters were passed around a program waiting for the glorious moment when someone would remember to perform an operation to display them as text: but someone, somewhere, abstracted this into a consistent set of of operations - Upper-case, concatenation, find-and-replace, etc- and named named this set (or the objects that it applies to) a 'String'. <br /><br />Any ideas when? Grace Hopper and COBOL?<br /><br />For most working programmers, the ability (and the necessity) to discriminate between strings and numbers was their first encounter with the concept of a 'type'. <br /><br />For many, this encompasses the entirety of their understanding of the concept.<br /><br /><br />Nigel Heffernanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08954578765691578714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post-54657391118521843032015-02-03T03:35:37.689+00:002015-02-03T03:35:37.689+00:00I disagree with this history quite a lot.
I would...I disagree with this history quite a lot.<br /><br />I would say that types were first invented by Russell and Whitehead in Principia Mathematica in 1910. Even if you don't want to consider the formal language of PM a computer language, it lead directly to the invention of Church's Lambda Calculus which, within 5 years, was augmented into the Simply Typed Lambda Calculus which is clearly a vital, powerful computer language using types of the same form as we consider them today. We merely use richer ones.<br /><br />You might argue that Church did not invent the LC or STLC as a computer language but instead as a mathematical formal language which is essentially true. However, LC was designed to be a universal computing language of a sort and Turing, after the invention of his Turing Universal Machine formalism, proved that TMs and LC are equivalently expressive thus cementing LCs interpretation as a computer language.<br /><br />I'd be behind this timeline as a timeline of "types as they appear in engineered computer languages", I suppose, but I have a hard time swallowing a claim that types are anything less than 100 years old. They've been around since the dawn of rigorous formal languages.Joseph Abrahamsonhttp://jspha.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6454006.post-54682568685625039612015-02-01T04:19:21.646+00:002015-02-01T04:19:21.646+00:00Algol 68 in both its 1968 and 1972 recensions used...Algol 68 in both its 1968 and 1972 recensions used "mode" consistently, not only in the metalanguage but in the language itself: what we would now call type declarations begin with the word <b>mode</b>. It also spoke of monadic and dyadic operators.John Cowanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11452247999156925669noreply@blogger.com