alt Hacker NewsI'm not smarter than you but.
I believe the terms reified generics and erased generics is the type sweaty donkey ball terminology you get for professional CS academics.
Sticking my neck out further.
Reified generics means the type is available at run time. In C# you can write if(obj.GetType() == typeof(typename))
Erased generics the type information is not available at run time. That's the way Java does it and it kinda sucks.
Replies
> Erased generics the type information is not available at run time. That's the way Java does it and it kinda sucks.
In a good statically-typed language you don't need runtime type information. It could be a Void in the bytecode for all I care, as long as it behaves correctly.
> obj.GetType() == typeof(typename)
In a statically-typed language, this can be optimised away to a bool at compile time.
> Erased generics the type information is not available at run time. That's the way Java does it and it kinda sucks.
To be more precise: in Java, generics on class/method/field declarations are available at runtime via reflection. The issue is that they aren’t available for instances. So a java.util.ArrayList<java.lang.String> instance is indistinguishable at runtime from a java.util.ArrayList<java.lang.Object> instance
Academics invent short names for common (in their field) concepts not because they're 'sweaty' but because if the thing you're going to mention in every second paragraph in a good chunk of the communication you do with other people working on the same topic requires a full sentence to explain you're going to A. get really annoyed at having to type it out all the time and B. probably explain it slightly differently every time and confuse people.
Academic jargon isn't invented to be elitist, it's invented to improve communication.
(of course there's a good chance you understand this already, and you're just making a dumb joke, but I figured I'd explain this anyway for the benefit of everyone reading)