> Yes, which makes one wonder about type systems in programming languages and > if they're any better than documented conventions of I/O. (i think they > may not be, but they serve some documentation purposes all their own)
the unix model is that files are typeless. or at most the linker refuses to read files it can't read. before unix, oses typically had file types enforced by the operating system. while the bell labs incination to be typeless has worked very well for files, it has turned out that you really want types for programming languages. i haven't seen any evidence that strongly typed files are a good idea. but maybe others have? - erik
