Newsgroups: comp.lang.smalltalk
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From: markjr@netcom.com (Mark Roulo)
Subject: Strong type checking...
Message-ID: <markjrD55495.GLo@netcom.com>
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Date: Wed, 8 Mar 1995 21:12:41 GMT
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	My company will be beginning a new project shortly and we are
still considering both languages and operating systems.  The languages
that are effectively in the running are: C++, Smalltalk, and Eiffel.
Because this is going to be a large (250,000 - 1,000,000 C equivelent line)
project involving about 12 to 20 programmers, strong type checking is
kinda important.  So ... can anyone tell me if there is a way to:
	a) Add strong type checking to Smalltalk (this method only
	   takes numbers, for example, and then have all the source code
	   scanned to insure that this is the case).
	b) Provide statistics that show that the advantages of *not*
	   needing to do your own garbage collection (free/malloc, new/delete)
	   outweigh the lack of type checking from the standpoint of building
	   robust applications.

Essentially we are looking for a way to increase the robustness of Smalltalk
without losing the rapid response during development and the powerful
development environment.

			In advance, thanks,

					-Mark Roulo
