[jwatzman]

Languages like SML and OCaml also use this sort of type inference, but you tend to not need type annotations in those languages except in very special cases. I think this is also fairly true of Haskell -- type inference works in 99% of the cases, and explicit type annotations are just a stylistic thing.

[rtperson]

Most of the time you're right. But I've done a fair bit of tinkering with Haskell's OpenGL library. Trying to get GHC to differentiate between a Float and a GLfloat inside a Vector is pretty much impossible without resorting to explicit typing. This definitely qualifies as a special case, but it's cropped up often enough as to make me a little gun shy. You don't need to explicitly type everything, just enough to give the compiler a credible hint as to what you're trying to do -- such as the last term in your vector.

The sad thing about the original article is that the writer is throwing his hands up and raging over what is really a small implementation hiccup. I kind of like that the compiler withholds judgment on whether '5' is a Float, Int, or Integer. It means that I no longer need to type ".0" after every Float.