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Comment by ianwalter | Hacker News Reader

Funny how you say the two are completely unrelated and then go on to show how they are related with your personal experience.

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While you're technically correct, this misses the value of static type checking vs type checking in tests. Tests must be written manually, must check every code path and must be updated whenever the underlying implementation changes, in order to achieve the results of static type checking. But types are declarative and will be checked automatically for every code path called.

1. If you dob't have tests covering code, sure type checks are better than nothing. but if you do, why do you also need type checks?

2. If the tests must be updated whenever the underlying implementation changes it might be testing too much- it's better to test behaviour, not implementation.

I was addressing the above comments about tests that specifically check types. My position is that declarative types and a type checker are better because each code path is checked automatically without writing additional tests, and because the type checker automatically adapts without changing or writing new tests when the implementation changes. Testing behavior is another thing entirely.

I'm not missing the value we just have a different idea of what that value is, but anyway, this is a different, more specific topic than the one I originally brought up and one that I don't feel like engaging in.

I think it exactly addresses your original topic, but you're in no way obligated to engage it further. Have a nice day!

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