Subject: Re: Reply to Ousterhout's reply (was Re: Ousterhout and Tcl ...) From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.no> Date: 1997/04/16 Newsgroups: comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.scheme.scsh,comp.lang.lisp,comp.lang.tcl,comp.lang.functional,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.python,comp.lang.eiffel Message-ID: <3070209881177993@naggum.no> * Charles Lin | If one had to choose a single type for everything, a string is a pretty | good choice. Why not a number? How would you represent a string with a | number? excuse me? what you call a "string" already _is_ a number. computers don't have characters. display devices and printers do. one of the first lessons of computer science _should_ have been internal and external representation are so wildly different concepts that they cannot even be confused, except, of course, by people who are fully aware of the difference, but proceed to attempt to obliterate it. #\Erik -- I'm no longer young enough to know everything.