Facebook to release PHP static analyser for compile-time type safety

Last time i submitted something from the php internals mailing list, it couldn't cope with HN traffic, so here's a preemptive mirror:

    One last comment in favor of the HHVM syntax:
    
      We're written (and will very soon be releasing, I promise) a static
    analysis tool which looks at your entire code base and determines
    types for every local variable in use and tells you (without having to
    run the program) where you have type issues.  This means two things:
    
    1) No need to do runtime checks (Which impact performance)
    2) No need to get to 100% code-coverage to guarantee type safety.
    
    And the type-checker can run in the background re-evaluating the files
    as they're updated for instant notification.
    
    If PHP were to follow HHVM's syntax, we'd get the type-checker as a
    freebie.  (If and when we took on return and scalar type hints as
    well)
    
    -Sara