I am creating a mini language as a compiler learning project that I hope to publish - and one of the things I am trying to figure out is a type system. I am looking at how to model Null for instance, and I am looking at the type system in Whiley as inspiration. I was intrigued that While has an explicit Reference type. Why is that? If my language is similar to Java - is it useful to have an explicit Reference / Pointer type, or can this be implicit?
Hi
I am creating a mini language as a compiler learning project that I hope to publish - and one of the things I am trying to figure out is a type system. I am looking at how to model Null for instance, and I am looking at the type system in Whiley as inspiration. I was intrigued that While has an explicit Reference type. Why is that? If my language is similar to Java - is it useful to have an explicit Reference / Pointer type, or can this be implicit?