- Beginners - Haskell.org

A Comparison of Haskell and Scheme
by Benjamin L.Russell 10 Feb '09

10 Feb '09

Although somewhat dated (posted on October 24, 2006 4:39 PM, to be precise), here is an interesting comparison of Haskell and Scheme, by Mark C. Chu-Carroll, a PhD computer scientist who works as a software engineer at Google, on his blog, regarding whether someone should translate Douglas Hofstadter's columns introducing Scheme to replace the Scheme code with Haskell code: Good Math, Bad Math : Haskell and Scheme: Which One and Why? http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2006/10/haskell_and_scheme_which_one_a.php The entry discusses differences in syntax, typing, and semantics, and makes for interesting reading. Surprisingly, he states that Haskell syntax is easier to learn for beginners: >I've actually taught an introduction to computer class using Scheme, >and the syntax was a big problem. > >I think that syntactically, Haskell is a better language for beginners. >Haskell syntax is very redundant, which is good for people. Compare >these two little snippets: > >(define (fact n) > (if (= n 0) > 1 > (* n (fact (- n 1))))) > >fact n = if n == 0 > then 1 > else n * fact(n-1) > >Which is easier to read? And the Haskell can get even easier to read >and write using pattern matching: > >fact 0 = 1 >fact n = n * fact (n-1) > >Try this comparison: > >(define (fold init reducer list) > (if (eq? list ()) > init > (reducer (car list) (fold init reducer (cdr list))))) > >versus: > >fold init reducer [] = init >fold init reducer l:ls = reducer l (fold init reducer ls) > >The difference gets much more obvious with bigger pieces of code. >Between the deliberate redundancies in Haskell's syntax, and the way >that pattern matching lets you decompose programs, the Haskell is >significantly clearer. This is the first time that I have seen a claim that Scheme syntax was a big problem compared to Haskell syntax, but his claims make sense. It makes me wonder whether his students were true beginners.... If his claims are true, though, then we probably need a counterpart to SICP (see http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/) for Haskell. The closest I can think of is SOE (see http://www.haskell.org/soe/) any alternatives? There's also _The Haskell Road to Logic, Maths and Programming_ (see http://homepages.cwi.nl/~jve/HR/) and _Real World Haskell_ (see http://book.realworldhaskell.org/) but the former is really about using Haskell to learn discrete mathematics and logic, and the latter is not directed toward computer science majors, so they don't correspond very closely. If Haskell is well-suited as a language for beginners, then there shouldn't be any reason for not creating a Haskell alternative. -- Benjamin L. Russell -- Benjamin L. Russell / DekuDekuplex at Yahoo dot com http://dekudekuplex.wordpress.com/ Translator/Interpreter / Mobile: +011 81 80-3603-6725 "Furuike ya, kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto." -- Matsuo Basho^

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Appending to a list
by Francesco Bochicchio 09 Feb '09

09 Feb '09

Hi all, in my haskell exercises I often build list by appending values at the end. But I read somewhere that in haskell this is inefficient since there is no 'pointer to the tail of the list'. I've also seen some example of recursive functions which build the list tail-first and then in the base case of the recursion returns the reverse of the accumulated results, counting on the fact that in haskell 'reverse list' just means 'consume the list from the tail'. Just out of curiosity (I have no need to speed up my little programs with which I try to teach myself some haskell): is this a consolidated pattern? And are append really expensive? Ciao ------- FB

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Installing packages
by Tymur Porkuian 08 Feb '09

08 Feb '09

I'm trying to install wxcore-0.11.0 using Cabal. I've downloaded it from http://hackage.haskell.org/cgi-bin/hackage-scripts/package/wxcore-0.11.0, unpacked and tried to follow instructions from http://haskell.org/haskellwiki/Cabal/How_to_install_a_Cabal_package, but this is what I'm getting: D:\libraries\wxcore-0.11.0>runhaskell Setup configure Setup: sh: runGenProcess: does not exist (No such file or directory) What does this mean?

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Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: [Haskell-beginners] Just how unsafe is unsafe
by Roel van Dijk 06 Feb '09

06 Feb '09

On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 5:22 PM, Alberto G. Corona <agocorona(a)gmail.com> wrote: > then Data.List.head Data.Maybe.fromMaybe etc are also unsafe?. Yes, I consider them unsafe. Whenever I see those functions I know that I have to look elsewhere to see if their preconditions hold. I would have preferred that listToMaybe was called head and the existing head called unsafeHead, partialHead or something else of that nature. > unsafe does > not mean "with possible errors". unsafeXXX convert something in the IO monad > into something that is not. So it can potentially contaminate your pure > code. > But Data.List.head applied to a empty list will interrupt the computation > abruptly, so your code using head will either run side effect free or not > run at all. I guess what unsafe should mean is a matter of taste. Personally I find correctness more important that pureness. An unsafe function will crash your program if evaluated when its preconditions do not hold. Whether that is because of impurity (segmentation fault?), a partial pattern match or a direct error "bla" is not that important. It might be important when determining why your program crashed, but the result is still the same. The ByteString library has a module called Data.ByteString.Unsafe with plenty of unsafeXXX functions. The comment for unsafeHead for example states: "A variety of head for non-empty ByteStrings. unsafeHead omits the check for the empty case, so there is an obligation on the programmer to provide a proof that the ByteString is non-empty." That perfectly reflects my own philosophy on this issue.

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Parsing a file with data divided into sections
by Patrick LeBoutillier 06 Feb '09

06 Feb '09

Hi all, I wanted to parse a file that looks like this: MONDAY JOHN JIM LINDA TUESDAY BILL BOB WEDNESDAY THURSDAY SAM TODD LARRY LUKE FRIDAY TED in order to count the number of people for each day. After a (very) long time and a lot of trial and error, I managed to do it with this program: import Char (isSpace) main = interact (unlines . countSections . lines) where countSections = map (show) . snd . foldr compileSections (0, []) compileSections line (n, acc) = if isSection line then (0, (line, n) : acc) else (n + 1, acc) isSection line = not . isSpace . head $ line which outputs: ("MONDAY",3) ("TUESDAY",2) ("WEDNESDAY",0) ("THURSDAY",4) ("FRIDAY",1) I had quite a hard time figuring out how to keep count of the number of records in each sections. Is there a more obvious way to handle these types of problems? Are there some builtins that could of made it easier? In Perl I would probably have used a hash and a variable to keep count of the current day, incrementing the hash value for each person until I got to the next day, but it's not obvious to me how to transpose this technique to functional programming. Thanks a lot, Patrick -- ===================== Patrick LeBoutillier Rosemère, Québec, Canada

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Just how unsafe is unsafe
by Andrew Wagner 06 Feb '09

06 Feb '09

So we all know the age-old rule of thumb, that unsafeXXX is simply evil and anybody that uses it should be shot (except when it's ok). I understand that unsafeXXX allows impurity, which defiles our ability to reason logically about haskell programs like we would like to. My question is, to what extent is this true? Suppose we had a module, UnsafeRandoms, which had a function that would allow you to generate a different random number every time you call it. The semantics are relatively well-defined, impurity is safely sectioned off in its own impure module, which is clearly labeled as such. How much damage does this do? Can we push the lines elsewhere? Is sectioning unsafeXXX into Unsafe modules a useful idiom that we can use for other things as well?

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linked lists
by Matthew J. Williams 03 Feb '09

03 Feb '09

Dear All What would be the haskell equivalent of the C++ linked list complete with nodes? the list structure -- x:[} -- is the closest I've found. Sincerely Matthew J. Williams

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Understanding cached fibonnacci function
by Patrick LeBoutillier 31 Jan '09

31 Jan '09

Hi all, I recently stumbled on this example in some wiki: mfib :: Int -> Integer mfib = (map fib [0 ..] !!) where fib 0 = 0 fib 1 = 1 fib n = mfib (n-2) + mfib (n-1) I don't understand how the results get cached. When mfib is recursively called, doesn't a new (map fib [0 ..] !!) start over again? Or perhaps I'm thinking too imperatively here... Also, if I change the definition to this (adding "a" on both sides): mfib :: Int -> Integer mfib a = (map fib [0 ..] !!) a where fib 0 = 0 fib 1 = 1 fib n = mfib (n-2) + mfib (n-1) the funtion becomes slow again. Why is that? Thanks a lot, Patrick LeBoutillier -- ===================== Patrick LeBoutillier Rosemère, Québec, Canada

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Understanding cached fibonnacci function
by Patrick LeBoutillier 30 Jan '09

30 Jan '09

Hi all, I recently stumbled on this example in some wiki: mfib :: Int -> Integer mfib = (map fib [0 ..] !!) where fib 0 = 0 fib 1 = 1 fib n = mfib (n-2) + mfib (n-1) I don't understand how the results get cached. When mfib is recursively called, doesn't a new (map fib [0 ..] !!) start over again? Or perhaps I'm thinking too imperatively here... Also, if I change the definition to this (adding "a" on both sides): mfib :: Int -> Integer mfib a = (map fib [0 ..] !!) a where fib 0 = 0 fib 1 = 1 fib n = mfib (n-2) + mfib (n-1) the funtion becomes slow again. Why is that? Thanks a lot, Patrick LeBoutillier -- ===================== Patrick LeBoutillier Rosemère, Québec, Canada

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Re : Re: [Haskell-beginners] Compile type Error
by emmanuel.delaborde 30 Jan '09

30 Jan '09

On 29 Jan 2009, at 16:10, beginners-request(a)haskell.org wrote: > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > > I didn't compile, but, by the looks of it, I would change > > import qualified Data.ByteString as BS (readFile) > > for > > import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BS (readFile) > > > as it seems sha1 needs a lazy bytestring Thanks ! It compiles now but brings me to my real problem :) If I uncomment this line "md5" -> md5sum I get the following : ------ module Main where import System.Environment (getArgs) import Data.Digest.OpenSSL.MD5 (md5sum) import Data.Digest.Pure.SHA (sha1, showDigest) import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BS (readFile) -- sha1 :: ByteString -> Digest -- readFile :: FilePath -> IO ByteString -- md5sum :: ByteString -> String -- showDigest :: Digest -> String checkHash :: String -> String -> String -> IO () checkHash codec hash file = let f = case codec of "md5" -> md5sum "sha1" -> showDigest . sha1 _ -> error "Codec must be md5 or sha1 !" in BS.readFile file >>= \fileBS -> let fileHash = f fileBS in print (hash == fileHash) main = getArgs >>= \as -> case as of (codec:hash:file:_) -> checkHash codec hash file _ -> usage usage = print "checksum codec hash file" ------ which now fails to compile with this error : checksum.hs:17:22: Couldn't match expected type `Data.ByteString.Internal.ByteString' against inferred type `Data.ByteString.Lazy.Internal.ByteString' In the expression: showDigest . sha1 In a case alternative: "sha1" -> showDigest . sha1 In the expression: case codec of { "md5" -> md5sum "sha1" -> showDigest . sha1 _ -> error "Codec must be md5 or sha1 !" } How can I both use md5sum and sha1 when one use a lazy ByteString end the other one does not ? Thanks E -- Emmanuel Delaborde Web Technologist Cimex 53-55 Scrutton Street, London UK, EC2A 4PJ T: +44 (0)20 7324 7780 F: +44 (0)20 7324 7781 http://www.cimex.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This e-mail (and any attachments) is confidential and may contain personal views which are not the views of Cimex Media Ltd and any affiliated companies, unless specifically stated. It is intended for the use of the individual or group to whom it is addressed. If you have received it in error, please delete it from your system, do not use, copy or disclose the information in any way nor act in reliance on it and please notify postmaster(a)cimex.com A company registered in England Wales. Company Number 03765711 Registered Office : The Olde Bakehouse, 156 Watling Street East, Towcester, Northants NN12 6DB This email was scanned by Postini, the leading provider in Managed Email Security.

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