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There is no way any of this process takes less time to solve than "I got a red squiggle in my editor and fixed the variable spelling". I don't think typos are r

There is no way any of this process takes less time to solve than "I got a red squiggle in my editor and fixed the variable spelling". I don't think typos are really the only things type systems fix (type systems provide powerful ways of preventing screw-ups by allowing you to encode invariants about a piece of data and how it may be used), but if typos are indeed the extent of it, it seems unimaginable to me that the process to fix would be faster by going through code review -> CI pipeline -> deploy and then back again, no matter how fast it is to revert a change in production. Honestly that's just the compile-time safety advantage of types, half the time saved in typescript is just not spending time having to read someone else's source code to figure out how a function may be used because cowboy js devs were too lazy to document them (knex is an especially egregious offender in this regard that I thankfully don't have to use anymore).

lewisl9029 7y ago
I never claimed it was "faster". Of course static types allow you to catch errors earlier in the process than without. Whether or not that delta is worthwhile compared to a dynamically typed codebase with a well-optimized deployment/error detection system is not always clear however. Especially considering the costs of a static type system in limiting expressiveness compared to dynamic code and the mental overhead required when building abstractions that require layers upon layers of generics and higher order types to fully specify statically (library authors probably feel this pain the most).
- hderms 7y ago
  Some patterns or abstractions are more difficult in statically typed code but after a while you start to realize you probably shouldn't use them most of the time. Static typing makes it very easy to be _precisely_ abstract, and have some proof that things which claim to be that abstraction actually satisfy a certain structure. Dynamic typing may make it easy to be abstract in all kinds of crazy ways (I'm looking at you ruby metaprgroamming) but without safety abstraction can easily be more of a liability than a benefit. I'd encourage you to keep your mind open to it's potential benefits as I've felt it has been a truly transformative experience that I'd like others to share.

lewisl9029 7y ago

I never claimed it was "faster". Of course static types allow you to catch errors earlier in the process than without. Whether or not that delta is worthwhile compared to a dynamically typed codebase with a well-optimized deployment/error detection system is not always clear however. Especially considering the costs of a static type system in limiting expressiveness compared to dynamic code and the mental overhead required when building abstractions that require layers upon layers of generics and higher order types to fully specify statically (library authors probably feel this pain the most).

hderms 7y ago
Some patterns or abstractions are more difficult in statically typed code but after a while you start to realize you probably shouldn't use them most of the time. Static typing makes it very easy to be _precisely_ abstract, and have some proof that things which claim to be that abstraction actually satisfy a certain structure. Dynamic typing may make it easy to be abstract in all kinds of crazy ways (I'm looking at you ruby metaprgroamming) but without safety abstraction can easily be more of a liability than a benefit. I'd encourage you to keep your mind open to it's potential benefits as I've felt it has been a truly transformative experience that I'd like others to share.