Hi John I can't see there is a way of getting the name of a variable. A Haskell compiler like GHC is fairly free to do what it likes with /values/, so a variable doesn't necessarily exist in a tangible form in a program - i.e. it might get compiled away due to constant folding[*]: main = let x = 5 in do { print (10 * x) } ... would likely become: main = do { print (10 * 5) } -- by constant folding ... and finally main = do { print 50 } -- by static expression elimination -- Values not /variables/ - are more tangible. Provided the type of the value is an instance of the type class Data, you can get at least the value's type name and its constructor name. To get something like named variable you would have to make a data type with two fields one for a name label and one for the value, e.g. : data Named a = Named String a deriving (Show) valName :: Named a -> String valName (Name s _) = s valValue :: Named a -> a valValue (Name _ a) = a When you use a variable you want associated with a name, you will have to be a bit pedantic about always supplying the same name to construct it: e.g.: if you have a constant called scale_factor scale_factor :: Named Int scale_factor = Named "scale_factor" 10 [At an advanced level you could probably use Template Haskell to make this easier] -- Your program would then be something like : writeFileFor :: Named a -> IO () writeFileFor v = do let nameOfV = valName v outh <- openFile (nameOfV ++ ".txt") WriteMode let outputstring = calculationsFrom (varValue v) hPutStr outh outputstring hClose outh Though it would more succinct to use pattern matching: writeFileFor :: Named a -> IO () writeFileFor (Named name value) = do outh <- openFile (name ++ ".txt") WriteMode let outputstring = calculationsFrom value hPutStr outh outputstring hClose outh As a side issue - having access to variables rather than values seems an usually prospect for any programming language. I'd guess that it would effectively prevent the language being compiled or the language would would have to limit reflective / introspective access only to global variables. Best wishes Stephen [*] Actually for important reasons GHC does not do that much constant folding - but it is possibly the easiest optimization to use as an illustration here.