Re: Do interfaces make sense in multiple dispatch languages?

> I think that the term "interface" and the phrase "implements
> interface" are both very confusing because they do not match the
> underlying abstract model of the language. 

We don't seem to state clearly enough what the underlying model of the
language is - IMO folk who haven't previously used multimethods (like
me) need this to be in Really Big Letters ;-) 

The current user manual is a big improvement, IMO Chapter 2 should
outline these fundamental differences: in Nice a class is a datatype -
a class does not contain methods in the way that Java does; in Nice a
method is a generic function, dynamically dispatched according to the
type of all its parameters - a method is not associated with a
particular class; although in many cases we can write Nice in a way
very similair to how we would write Java.

Haven't I been a sufficient example of someone experienced with single
inheritance OO, just not getting what was different about Nice ;-)

The computational model isn't what people are used to - we need to say
it loud and often to overcome their previous experience. That much I
agree with.

> In Nice, all we can say is that an interface introduces a type; it
> does not define a set of methods. That is why I suggested to
> replace "interface Y { }" with "type Y" and "class X extends Z
> implements Y { ... }" with "class X <: Y" (read "class X
> extends Z and conforms to type Y").
 
If an interface is a type, what's a class? Isn't a class a type?


> I don't think it makes sense to call a Nice interface a "trait"
(You're agreeing with Daniel). I agree too. 

> 2. Whether to implement multiple inheritence of state.
Let's see what can be done without it.

> The more I think about this the more it seems I am suggesting that
> the Nice team re-implement Cecil. 
That would be a Cecil that can reuse existing Java libraries?

best wishes, Isaac

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Finance: Get your refund fast by filing online.
http://taxes.yahoo.com/filing.html


-------------------------------------------------------
The SF.Net email is sponsored by EclipseCon 2004
Premiere Conference on Open Tools Development and Integration
See the breadth of Eclipse activity. February 3-5 in Anaheim, CA.
http://www.eclipsecon.org/osdn