from Hacker News

Architecture that extends types using extension methods (Microsoft patent)

by archielc on 11/7/21, 2:20 AM with 3 comments

• by earleybird on 11/7/21, 5:18 AM

  The expression problem has been known for quite some time [0].

  Final tagless[1] is an fp approach and Object algebras[2] is an oop approach to solving this problem.

  Setting aside the timelime, reading the various claims it seems like Eric Meijer, Anders Hejlsberg et al still had a hard time obfuscating the math to make patentable claims. A naive read (on my part) of the claims looks like they wished to patent Object Algebras.

  [0] https://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/wadler/papers/expression/expr...

  [1] https://okmij.org/ftp/tagless-final/

  [2] https://blog.acolyer.org/2015/11/13/scrap-your-boilerplate-w...

• by transfire on 11/7/21, 3:23 AM

  Welcome to the bizarro world of software patents where prior art no longer matters.

• by throwuxiytayq on 11/7/21, 7:03 AM

  So much for C# being open-source, I guess? Is it even safe to fork this repo? https://github.com/dotnet/csharpstandard