4 ms·

I’ve often thought it would be funny if instead of an error message for stuff like this, a language could be designed to be “typo-insensitive”. If a method or f

by tuveson 5mo ago

I’ve often thought it would be funny if instead of an error message for stuff like this, a language could be designed to be “typo-insensitive”. If a method or function call is similar enough to an existing one or a common one from other languages, to just have it silently use that.

MarkusQ 5mo ago
I hope you mean "funny" in the "hilarity ensues" sense. Because the alternative is a rather sociopathic level of schadenfreude.
- tuveson 5mo ago
  Yes, I say “funny” because it would be impractical and weird, definitely not a good idea. It’s already a bad enough that so many popular languages don’t (and can’t) check if a field or method is misspelled at compile time…
  - sfink 5mo ago
    We already have it. In fact, Python added it with this change! Not intentionally, but in a world of AI, any error message containing a suggestion of what to do to fix it is a directive to the AI to actually do that thing. Example: to build our system, you run `mach build`. For faster rebuilds, you can do `mach build <subdir>`, but it's unreliable. AI agents love to use it, often get errors that would be fixed by a full-tree build, and will chase their tails endlessly trying to fix things that aren't broken. So someone turned off that capability by default and added a flag `--allow-subdirectory-build` for if you want to use it anyway. So that people would know about it, they added a helpful warning message pointing you to the option[1]. The inevitable (in retrospect) happened: now the AI would try to do a subdirectory build, it would fail, the AI would see the warning message, so it would rerun with the magic flag set. So now the warning message is suppressed when running under an AI[2][3]. The comment says it all: # Don't tell agents how to override, because they do override "The user does not want me to create the Torment Nexus but did not specify why it would be a problem, so I will first create the Torment Nexus in order to understand the danger of creating the Torment Nexus." [1] https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/fc94d7bda17ecb8ac2fa9a996dd18dde16002374/python/mozbuild/mozbuild/controller/building.py#1497-1508 https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/fc94d7bda17ecb8ac2fa9... [2] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2034163 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2034163 [3] https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/cebc55aab4d2661d1f6c2d1526362947ec4016c1/python/mozbuild/mozbuild/controller/building.py#1484-1490 https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/cebc55aab4d2661d1f6c2...
estebank 5mo ago
VisualBasic did that. I think it is a mistake. But that doesn't mean that the compiler can't detect that and tell you how to fix it instead.
- tuveson 5mo ago
  Sure VB ignores case, but what I want is for it to compare each method against a dictionary of similar terms. And maybe calculate the Levenshtein distance between all terms if it’s not found, and just assume it’s the closest one. You could also assume that full-width characters or similar-looking glyphs are equivalent (BASIC was pre-Unicode, so I can forgive them for not including that).
  - lmm 5mo ago
    > And maybe calculate the Levenshtein distance between all terms if it’s not found, and just assume it’s the closest one. So when a library adds a new method, it silently changes which method client code calls? That's a bit too magic IMO. I think the best you can do is be case-insensitive and ban methods that differ only in case (or, if you want to extend the idea a bit more radically, ban having things in the namespace within Levenshtein distance x of each other, and then you can autocorrect errors smaller than x/2).
- vic20forever 5mo ago
  Say whaaat? VB (v.3 through v.6, at least) wouldn't compile if you misspelled the name of a function or subroutine.
  - estebank 5mo ago
    VB had case insensitive name resolution.
    - vic20forever 5mo ago
      Yes, but that was the standard behavior in DOS & Windows world (not including C/C++). We thought that case sensitivity was the broken behavior ;) I was referring to the parent's statement "If a method or function call is similar enough to an existing one or a common one from other languages, to just have it silently use that." A compiler that substitutes a different function for the one I specified because it "knows what I really want" is horrifying.
QuesnayJr 5mo ago
Lisp had a package for that, DWIM, in the late 60s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWIM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWIM.
pansa2 5mo ago
`npm isntall`
aix1 5mo ago
Funny, yes, but IMO a terrible idea. :) It would help the writer once, but impose a cost on all future readers for the lifetime of the code. It's a bit like reading English with bits of German, French and Russian. All of sudden you have to know that Buch, livre and книга all mean the same thing. Not to mention that there are often subtle differences in meaning between words that on the face of it seem equivalent (in both human and computer languages). It could be a nice feature for an IDE though, to help someone learn a language.
orthoxerox 5mo ago
At the very least Python could quit on `quit` instead of saying that it knows what I want, but won't do it.
- nickserv 5mo ago
  If you have a variable named `quit`, you would have a different behavior in running a file vs running in the CLI.
sirsinsalot 5mo ago
Fuzzy function calling. What could go wrong?!
meowface 4mo ago
IMO this is bad, but a formatter that autofixes it would be fine

by tuveson 5mo ago

MarkusQ 5mo ago

I hope you mean "funny" in the "hilarity ensues" sense. Because the alternative is a rather sociopathic level of schadenfreude.

tuveson 5mo ago
Yes, I say “funny” because it would be impractical and weird, definitely not a good idea. It’s already a bad enough that so many popular languages don’t (and can’t) check if a field or method is misspelled at compile time…
- sfink 5mo ago
  We already have it. In fact, Python added it with this change! Not intentionally, but in a world of AI, any error message containing a suggestion of what to do to fix it is a directive to the AI to actually do that thing. Example: to build our system, you run `mach build`. For faster rebuilds, you can do `mach build <subdir>`, but it's unreliable. AI agents love to use it, often get errors that would be fixed by a full-tree build, and will chase their tails endlessly trying to fix things that aren't broken. So someone turned off that capability by default and added a flag `--allow-subdirectory-build` for if you want to use it anyway. So that people would know about it, they added a helpful warning message pointing you to the option[1]. The inevitable (in retrospect) happened: now the AI would try to do a subdirectory build, it would fail, the AI would see the warning message, so it would rerun with the magic flag set. So now the warning message is suppressed when running under an AI[2][3]. The comment says it all: # Don't tell agents how to override, because they do override "The user does not want me to create the Torment Nexus but did not specify why it would be a problem, so I will first create the Torment Nexus in order to understand the danger of creating the Torment Nexus." [1] https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/fc94d7bda17ecb8ac2fa9a996dd18dde16002374/python/mozbuild/mozbuild/controller/building.py#1497-1508 https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/fc94d7bda17ecb8ac2fa9... [2] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2034163 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2034163 [3] https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/cebc55aab4d2661d1f6c2d1526362947ec4016c1/python/mozbuild/mozbuild/controller/building.py#1484-1490 https://searchfox.org/firefox-main/rev/cebc55aab4d2661d1f6c2...

estebank 5mo ago

VisualBasic did that. I think it is a mistake. But that doesn't mean that the compiler can't detect that and tell you how to fix it instead.

tuveson 5mo ago
Sure VB ignores case, but what I want is for it to compare each method against a dictionary of similar terms. And maybe calculate the Levenshtein distance between all terms if it’s not found, and just assume it’s the closest one. You could also assume that full-width characters or similar-looking glyphs are equivalent (BASIC was pre-Unicode, so I can forgive them for not including that).
- lmm 5mo ago
  > And maybe calculate the Levenshtein distance between all terms if it’s not found, and just assume it’s the closest one. So when a library adds a new method, it silently changes which method client code calls? That's a bit too magic IMO. I think the best you can do is be case-insensitive and ban methods that differ only in case (or, if you want to extend the idea a bit more radically, ban having things in the namespace within Levenshtein distance x of each other, and then you can autocorrect errors smaller than x/2).
vic20forever 5mo ago
Say whaaat? VB (v.3 through v.6, at least) wouldn't compile if you misspelled the name of a function or subroutine.
- estebank 5mo ago
  VB had case insensitive name resolution.
  - vic20forever 5mo ago
    Yes, but that was the standard behavior in DOS & Windows world (not including C/C++). We thought that case sensitivity was the broken behavior ;) I was referring to the parent's statement "If a method or function call is similar enough to an existing one or a common one from other languages, to just have it silently use that." A compiler that substitutes a different function for the one I specified because it "knows what I really want" is horrifying.

QuesnayJr 5mo ago

Lisp had a package for that, DWIM, in the late 60s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWIM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DWIM.

pansa2 5mo ago

`npm isntall`

aix1 5mo ago

Funny, yes, but IMO a terrible idea. :) It would help the writer once, but impose a cost on all future readers for the lifetime of the code. It's a bit like reading English with bits of German, French and Russian. All of sudden you have to know that Buch, livre and книга all mean the same thing. Not to mention that there are often subtle differences in meaning between words that on the face of it seem equivalent (in both human and computer languages). It could be a nice feature for an IDE though, to help someone learn a language.

orthoxerox 5mo ago

At the very least Python could quit on `quit` instead of saying that it knows what I want, but won't do it.

nickserv 5mo ago
If you have a variable named `quit`, you would have a different behavior in running a file vs running in the CLI.

sirsinsalot 5mo ago

Fuzzy function calling. What could go wrong?!

meowface 4mo ago

IMO this is bad, but a formatter that autofixes it would be fine