Not a rhetorical question: How many flight-control codebases are written in a dynamically typed language ? Or for that matter, life support systems deployed in ICU's, really curious.
About the dynamic vs Static typing debate, I think it progresses firmly along Upton Sinclair'ish lines,
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"
I don't know the answer, sadly. My sardonic response is to ask how many are in what would be called a modern statically typed system?
That is, I expect the tooling around them is ridiculously high. Probably done with a model based development system. Probably not, however, what is typically seen as static typing in the modern landscape. (i.e. Haskell)
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised to find some lisp in there, just because. :)
> what would be called a modern statically typed system?
Now we are splitting hairs and looking for the one true scotsman. You asked for quantitative evidence, but the problem is that you have already made up your mind (perhaps only subconciously) and you will find a way to lookaway from the evidence or logic (which you term just an appeal). Lookup birthers for instance.
I for one have'nt heard of any flight control or life support software written in a dynamically typed language, whereas have heard of plenty written in what would qualify more as a statically typed than dynamically typed language. ADA in particular comes to mind. I dont discount that there might exist some written in a dynamic languages. Lets agree that they are quite hard to find. I wont be surprised with prototypes written in dynamic languages though.
> I wouldn't be surprised to find some lisp in there, [...] I'm open to being proven wrong.
Now that would be the Russel's teapot fallacy. I am not ruling it out, but for such assertions, the burden, I think, lies on the one making the assertion. You handed out an epistemic sucker punch there. The proof that you desire requires presenting the entire set of Lisp programs, or the entire set of flight control programs, both are quite ridiculous. BTW I do love lisp a whole freaking lot.
Curious about this: Say you have to be (god forbid) irradiated. There are two pieces of software written by two groups, one that uses statically typed, another that uses dynamically typed and this is all the information you have. Which one would you pick ? There is no right or wrong answer.
I will pick the one written by the group that uses statically typed language because of their cultural obsession with correctness. That is just a Bayesian prior, there are exceptions of course. Sqlite is indeed afflicted by the same obsession.
EDIT: @taeric
> If they are in a static language, then this should be an easy debate for you. Merely give me some evidence and we are done.
Ah! then lookup ADA's resume
> I'd pick the one that has the better track record and has been proven with more tests.
You are dodging the (silly) question sir :) I said thats the only thing you know. Anyways wasnt an important question and here's wishing that you never need to get irradiated with any such thing, seriously.
:( Why are we replying without going down the chain? I almost didn't even see you put more of a response to me.
Regardless, I'm familiar with Ada. I'm also familiar with some fun disasters using software by Ada.[1] Now, do I blame that it was in Ada? No. However, the attitude you are displaying of "if all you know is it was in Ada, then it is safer than the alternatives" seems to be the exact problem that led to that disaster.
If the only thing I know of two irradiation devices is one was statically typed and the other wasn't, I'd likely pass on both. Or I'd like to know how much radiation each is capable of outputting. Consider, x-ray machines far predate what we realize as programmable computers. And much more goes into the safety of the devices than just the language used.
> :( Why are we replying without going down the chain?
I dislike deeply nested, indentation cramped and tangential threads, so sometimes if I dont have anything that important to say I inline it. More so when everyone has left the building.
> I'm also familiar with some fun disasters using software by Ada.
I dont think we were ever discussing whether using Ada or some other statically type checked language immunizes a project against all other peripheral errors. That would be a supremely ridiculous and stupid claim to make.
Typechecking proves either that the code is type error free or that the typechecker has a bug. In the case of the latter, you try and fix it and the benefit percolates to every software verified by it. Testing proves that it passes only those specific test cases and only if the programmer tested it at all.
BTW the very first line says the fault had nothing to do with Ada. The source of the error was beyond the scope of typechecking.
To backtrack, our discussion was on whether there are notable examples of software written in dynamically typed languages where the cost of error is high.
Runtime error while spaceshuttle descends backs to earth, no thank you, on a fly-by-wire unit, when the pilot is breaking out of a loop, again no thank you. There are times when, no pun intended, you just cannot bail out and wash your hands off the situation, without terrible consequences. In such cases I would rather have the error surfaced in an environment where I can control the consequences, meaning early, and as exhaustively as possible.
Most importantly typechecking does not preclude/replace testing, it complements it.
Everything cannot be statically verified or insured against, but that does not mean that just because we cannot verify everything statically, we should verify nothing statically.
BTW Typical x-ray machines do not have the power to kill you in a single exposure, radiotherapy units absolutely can, example Therac.
The accidents occurred when the high-power electron beam
was activated instead of the intended low power beam, and
without the beam spreader plate rotated into place.
Previous models had hardware interlocks in place to
prevent this, but Therac-25 had removed them, depending
instead on software interlocks for safety. The software
interlock could fail due to a race condition.
I would rather have it proved (exhaustively, rather than with typical tests which would be anecdotaly) that such errors cannot happen.
Well, apologies for the nesting. :( I agree it is ugly, but is easier to spot changes. (Also.... I went to sleep. Sorry. Which, also, I was tired. My tone has been terrible in some of these messages. Apologies for that, as well. To all involved.)
I am aware, and agree with the opinion, that Ada had nothing to do with the error. However, I don't think many would disagree that the fact the code was in Ada gave the team that decided to reuse it more faith that it was "safely" reusable than had it been written in another language.
This is still not the fault of Ada, but it was the exact reasoning you are using to say I should prefer the statically typed solution over another, if that is all I know. My point is if that is all you know, you don't know enough to make a decision.
So, in my mind, our discussion was not over whether there are notable examples of software written in dynamically typed languages where the cost of error is high. The discussion is whether there have been studies showing that statically typed languages produce less bug prone software.
So, to your own example, what was Therac written in? Because, honestly, right off I don't know. I would not be surprised to know it was in a statically typed language. And note, I would not use that as an example of where typed safe languages are failures.
And then to wrap up back to your question. It doesn't take a lot of googling to find that Nasa used to use a Symbolics Lisp machine in their work. http://stackoverflow.com/a/563378/392812
I'm not trying to play the scotsman's game. Though, I can confess that that is the direction I am somewhat steering this. Not my main goal. My aim is more against the claims of the parent post. Note that there is a big difference between static tooling and statically typed languages. I have high regard for the both. And I've seen more evidence of the former in older, less statically typed, languages than I have the latter.
So, part of my point is I haven't ever "heard" what language those systems are written in, period. It isn't that I have heard they are in dynamic or static languages. I flat out never hear. If they are in a static language, then this should be an easy debate for you. Merely give me some evidence and we are done.
I do know that the older languaged programs I have seen are typically not in what one would call a statically typed language. There is plenty of static tooling on them, but to pretend that there is statically "typed" tooling around any software that ran something such as the space program feels like it is reaching. Heavily.
So, to your silly question. I'd pick the one that has the better track record and has been proven with more tests. I don't care if they are dynamic tests, statically typed assertions, statically analyzed assertions on a dynamically typed codebase, whatever. There are too many tools to care. Because I can hazard a guess that all of the things that have irradiated me in my years have not been by the strongest statically typed languages out there. :)
Empirical evidence. Studies indicating that software developed in statically-typed languages has fewer defects. Research into the speed of development and the ability to accommodate major changes in requirements and functionality would be useful as well.
Last I looked, there isn't a great deal of literature on this, and what there is is fairly old (dealing with '80s-'90s languages) and inconclusive.
No we weren't. We were talking about "being less bug prone" and "easier to read."
Though, I'm not entirely sure that really changes much. :(
Look, I'm not against static typing. I confess to being somewhat in love with lisp at the moment. And, I'm trying to learn MIXAL for some unholy reason. At the same time, I try to type my systems as well as I can. I am far from convinced that typing will be the way to go.
Especially if you consider auxiliary tools. Having used Coverity some, it is down right impressive the stability you can bring to a C codebase with proper discipline and the appropriate tooling. Compared to using something such as a Scala codebase, where right now your only recourse is the compiler.
That is, static analysis does not begin and end with the compiler. Sadly, in moving to "newer" statically typed languages, you through out many of the tools that currently exist in the older languages.
And this is not just for "correctness". Having finally added "-march=native" to my flags for a build of software, I'm literally amazed at how well optimized a compile can be versus just using "-O3". Optimizations in the modern world are quite amazing without necessarily needing "better types."
Isn't that a touch of a diversion? With the large target area of code covered by C, it makes the most sense that that is the heaviest targetted area. This list[1] shows that there are plenty of options to go around. Even Perl gets some love. :)
The presentation was interesting, but if there were any studies cited I didn't see them. I'm looking for deductive research into the proposal that using a modern statically-typed language results in a better outcome than a modern dynamically-typed one.
The related research I mentioned is useful because if development in a given language improves correctness but also increases development time by an order of magnitude it might still be more effective to develop software in the "worse" language and spend the additional available time mitigating the risk or building additional features.
No, googling those results doesn't really work. :) You get a ton of dogma with a lot of logical arguments. All of which are very appealing. Appealing arguments worry me, though.
What I have not seen, is evidence that any of your claims are true. I have seen easy to read programs in both dynamic and static languages. So far, I've seen very little correlation between the two as to which is desirable. The static languages are typically a bear on some algorithms because you have to provide so much more to the compiler for it to trust you. This does feel like it would lead to less bugs, but it goes against the "readable" and possibly the "more productive" ideas.
How do you determine the return value of a C function? You look at the function prototype. How do you determine the return value of a Python function? You have to read the whole thing. If you are working with large code bases, reading the whole thing is not really possible.
You are just trying to make an appealing argument. This literally adds nothing to the debate. A simple survey of open source software would be more convincing. And even that wouldn't be definitive.
It is an appeal to how logical the example seems. That is, it sounds like it would be applicable "at large." However, evidence seems to show that, "at large," it is mostly a non sequitor.
That is, you get better systems the more programmers you have that do have a good grasp on the whole system. Ironically, you have better arguments against knowing specifics of the system -- that is, at the individual function level -- than you do the high level picture. Consider, Linus knows the linux kernel better than I can really comprehend. I doubt he knows every function's return value.
About the dynamic vs Static typing debate, I think it progresses firmly along Upton Sinclair'ish lines,
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"