From lojbab@lojban.org Mon May 22 10:44:09 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 13778 invoked from network); 22 May 2000 17:44:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.27) by m1.onelist.org with QMQP; 22 May 2000 17:44:08 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO stmpy.cais.net) (205.252.14.63) by mta2 with SMTP; 22 May 2000 17:44:08 -0000 Received: from bob (209-8-89-171.dynamic.cais.com [209.8.89.171]) by stmpy.cais.net (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id NAA28793 for ; Mon, 22 May 2000 13:42:24 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <4.2.2.20000522134022.00b168c0@127.0.0.1> X-Sender: vir1036/pop.cais.com@127.0.0.1 X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Pro Version 4.2.2 Date: Mon, 22 May 2000 13:45:58 -0400 To: lojban@egroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] More on lojban programatic semantics: Strong typing and inferencing of types In-Reply-To: <39296707.A3D40886@concentric.net> References: <200005220306.XAA19855@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" At 12:58 PM 05/22/2000 -0400, Brook Conner wrote: > > Why not use the mekso variable declaration constructs? > >Because not all variables are mekso. A file isn't a mekso. Neither is a >string. > >Or are you suggesting that we use "operator overloading" kinds of things >for variables that aren't numbers or numerical expressions? The mekso grammar was specifically designed to allow such overloading. Almost any grammatical construct can be converted into a mekso component of some (probably appropriate) type. I specifically had in mind the possible use of Lojban as a program specification language as were appearing in the 80s as automated design tools. For a while I was tangentially involved in program proving for security purposes, and considered the requirements for mekso and Lojban to support such efforts as well. In particular, there is no requirement that mekso operate on numbers. String operations like concatenation certainly can be expressed using mathematical language. lojbab ---- lojbab lojbab@lojban.org Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org