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> You've talked right past me. Metaprogramming is not compile time text processing. I'm not talking past you. I never said metaprogramming is compile time text

> You've talked right past me. Metaprogramming is not compile time text processing. I'm not talking past you. I never said metaprogramming is compile time text processing. You said "Elixir can already accomplish compile time text processing with metaprogramming", and I was just pointing out that the text processing itself is not the most interesting part of the example, it's the resultant types. > No. It's probably even how the Microsoft team are achieving the typing you're talking about. The special sauce here isn't as special as you think. But I don't have to reimplement any of this, because Microsoft has already written it. With enough time maybe you could implement dependent typing using metaprogramming for example, but would you then say that Elixir is just as good at dependent typing as Idris, which has that feature built in? > I was just saying that what you're talking about is totally possible with metaprogramming. You've graduated from saying "I think someone more savvy with Elixir would know more." to "totally possible"[1]. This does not sound like an argument from experience. > That's specifically because strict static typing with guards^ is at least difficult, but maybe impossible, and that's what the PhDs are trying to figure out. A lot of what you're talking about has already been implemented in other languages. This is not untrodden ground. There's no syntactic sugar for guards in JS (which TS just adds type annotations to), but semantically it's very similar to type narrowing in TS [2], which I use daily. This is not something I've read about casually on the internet. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35944988 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35944988 [2]https://www.typescriptlang.org/docs/handbook/2/narrowing.html#handbook-content https://www.typescriptlang.org/docs/handbook/2/narrowing.htm...

h0l0cube 3y ago
> This is not something I've read about casually on the internet Was speaking specifically about your opinions on Dialyzer and Elixir. It's very much a cursory Google around and having stronger opinions about the limits of a language than people who spend time with the language. > You've graduated from saying "I think someone more savvy with Elixir would know more." It took further reflection on the idea. It helps to start with at least some epistemic humility, once again the crux of this thread. I'm willing to revert to, "It ought to be possible" given that macros boil down to the final generated code (including typespecs) which is then analyzed by Dialyzer > Elixir is just as good at dependent typing as Idris, which has that feature built in? Metaprogramming allows features to become 'built in'. e.g., being able to integrate type checking and compiler errors for HTML/XML or other DSLs. https://hexdocs.pm/eex/EEx.html#function_from_string/5 https://hexdocs.pm/eex/EEx.html#function_from_string/5 https://hexdocs.pm/phoenix_live_view/0.17.0/Phoenix.LiveView.Helpers.html#sigil_H/2 https://hexdocs.pm/phoenix_live_view/0.17.0/Phoenix.LiveView...
- Vaguely2178 3y ago
  > Was speaking specifically about your opinions on Dialyzer and Elixir. It's very much a cursory Google around and having stronger opinions about the limits of a language than people who spend time with the language. I think your experience with Elixir and Dialyzer (or perhaps emotional attachment to these tools) is blinding you to the fact that there are features that your favorite language lacks. I gave you a concrete example of something that's a research topic in Elixir (inferring types from guards), which has an existent analogue in TS (type narrowing). You completely ignored that and fixated on the one sentence about experience. Your entire argument is that I should defer to your authority on the topic as an anonymous commenter, because you're supposedly very experienced. It feels like a very hollow appeal to authority. > It took further reflection on the idea. But by your standards simple reflection is not enough to establish authority on a topic. You need to have deep personal experience with using macros to parse text before you're qualified to make a firm judgement. You event went so far as to speculate on how TypeScript implements type checking and claimed that the "secret sauce" is probably metaprogramming, despite having never worked on the compiler. This all feels incredibly contradictory. > Metaprogramming allows features to become 'built in'. e.g., being able to integrate type checking and compiler errors for HTML/XML or other DSLs. Built in does not mean "I might hypothetically be able to write my own macro that does this". It means it already exists in the language today. Honestly this discussion feels like it's devolved into repetitive bickering, which is why I let your original comment about metaprogramming stand unanswered, and you reacted by following me into a different comment thread to reiterate the point.
  - h0l0cube 3y ago
    > emotional attachment to these tools You've really misjudged me. I've been programming professionally for 20 years, I have used and still use a variety of languages including Typescript. > Your entire argument is that I should defer to your authority Never made such an argument. My argument is that you have less authority on the subject matter than someone who has spent years with the language. > I gave you a concrete example of something that's a research topic in Elixir (inferring types from guards), which has an existent analogue in TS (type narrowing) At best a subset of functionality than an analogue. This kind of research is being conducted by experts in type theory outside of Elixir. If it's a problem for Elixir, it's a problem for any other language that would attempt it, and absolutely I would defer to the authority of those experts who have spent years looking at type theory. > despite having never worked on the compiler Knowledge of meta-programming doesn't require the same skillset as writing a compiler. I'm certain you or any other capable software engineer, would be able to write a macro that parsed JSON, interrogated the typing of that JSON, and spat out a typespec with some knowledge of Elixir `defmacro`, `quote`, and `unquote`. > Built in does not mean "I might hypothetically be able to write my own macro that does this". Never made such a claim. My claim is that the JSON typing mechanism isn't really something that's dependent on the Typescript language and toolchain. As with my link on my last post of inline heex components, it's possible to take a text representation of something in Elixir and transform it into something that's available to the compiler (and hence also available to Dialyzer). > bickering Trust me there is no spite from my end.

h0l0cube 3y ago

> This is not something I've read about casually on the internet Was speaking specifically about your opinions on Dialyzer and Elixir. It's very much a cursory Google around and having stronger opinions about the limits of a language than people who spend time with the language. > You've graduated from saying "I think someone more savvy with Elixir would know more." It took further reflection on the idea. It helps to start with at least some epistemic humility, once again the crux of this thread. I'm willing to revert to, "It ought to be possible" given that macros boil down to the final generated code (including typespecs) which is then analyzed by Dialyzer > Elixir is just as good at dependent typing as Idris, which has that feature built in? Metaprogramming allows features to become 'built in'. e.g., being able to integrate type checking and compiler errors for HTML/XML or other DSLs. https://hexdocs.pm/eex/EEx.html#function_from_string/5 https://hexdocs.pm/eex/EEx.html#function_from_string/5 https://hexdocs.pm/phoenix_live_view/0.17.0/Phoenix.LiveView.Helpers.html#sigil_H/2 https://hexdocs.pm/phoenix_live_view/0.17.0/Phoenix.LiveView...

Vaguely2178 3y ago
> Was speaking specifically about your opinions on Dialyzer and Elixir. It's very much a cursory Google around and having stronger opinions about the limits of a language than people who spend time with the language. I think your experience with Elixir and Dialyzer (or perhaps emotional attachment to these tools) is blinding you to the fact that there are features that your favorite language lacks. I gave you a concrete example of something that's a research topic in Elixir (inferring types from guards), which has an existent analogue in TS (type narrowing). You completely ignored that and fixated on the one sentence about experience. Your entire argument is that I should defer to your authority on the topic as an anonymous commenter, because you're supposedly very experienced. It feels like a very hollow appeal to authority. > It took further reflection on the idea. But by your standards simple reflection is not enough to establish authority on a topic. You need to have deep personal experience with using macros to parse text before you're qualified to make a firm judgement. You event went so far as to speculate on how TypeScript implements type checking and claimed that the "secret sauce" is probably metaprogramming, despite having never worked on the compiler. This all feels incredibly contradictory. > Metaprogramming allows features to become 'built in'. e.g., being able to integrate type checking and compiler errors for HTML/XML or other DSLs. Built in does not mean "I might hypothetically be able to write my own macro that does this". It means it already exists in the language today. Honestly this discussion feels like it's devolved into repetitive bickering, which is why I let your original comment about metaprogramming stand unanswered, and you reacted by following me into a different comment thread to reiterate the point.
- h0l0cube 3y ago
  > emotional attachment to these tools You've really misjudged me. I've been programming professionally for 20 years, I have used and still use a variety of languages including Typescript. > Your entire argument is that I should defer to your authority Never made such an argument. My argument is that you have less authority on the subject matter than someone who has spent years with the language. > I gave you a concrete example of something that's a research topic in Elixir (inferring types from guards), which has an existent analogue in TS (type narrowing) At best a subset of functionality than an analogue. This kind of research is being conducted by experts in type theory outside of Elixir. If it's a problem for Elixir, it's a problem for any other language that would attempt it, and absolutely I would defer to the authority of those experts who have spent years looking at type theory. > despite having never worked on the compiler Knowledge of meta-programming doesn't require the same skillset as writing a compiler. I'm certain you or any other capable software engineer, would be able to write a macro that parsed JSON, interrogated the typing of that JSON, and spat out a typespec with some knowledge of Elixir `defmacro`, `quote`, and `unquote`. > Built in does not mean "I might hypothetically be able to write my own macro that does this". Never made such a claim. My claim is that the JSON typing mechanism isn't really something that's dependent on the Typescript language and toolchain. As with my link on my last post of inline heex components, it's possible to take a text representation of something in Elixir and transform it into something that's available to the compiler (and hence also available to Dialyzer). > bickering Trust me there is no spite from my end.