10 Facts About Run-time polymorphism

In programming language theory and type theory, polymorphism is the provision of a single interface to entities of different types or the use of a single symbol to represent multiple different types.

Ad hoc Run-time polymorphism was a feature of Algol 68, while parametric Run-time polymorphism was the core feature of ML's type system.

Christopher Strachey chose the term ad hoc Run-time polymorphism to refer to polymorphic functions that can be applied to arguments of different types, but that behave differently depending on the type of the argument to which they are applied.

Parametric Run-time polymorphism allows a function or a data type to be written generically, so that it can handle values uniformly without depending on their type.

Parametric Run-time polymorphism is a way to make a language more expressive while still maintaining full static type-safety.

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Parametric Run-time polymorphism is ubiquitous in functional programming, where it is often simply referred to as "Run-time polymorphism".

Row Run-time polymorphism is a similar, but distinct concept from subtyping.

Static Run-time polymorphism executes faster, because there is no dynamic dispatch overhead, but requires additional compiler support.

Further, static Run-time polymorphism allows greater static analysis by compilers, source code analysis tools, and human readers.

When Run-time polymorphism is exposed via a library, static Run-time polymorphism becomes impossible for dynamic libraries as there is no way of knowing what types the parameters are when the shared object is built.