10 Aug
2010
10 Aug
'10
2:35 a.m.
On Tuesday 10 August 2010 04:02:32, Daniel Fischer wrote:
It could, but it doesn't (at least not in core). Most of the time it doesn't make a significant difference whether you use (x ^ 2) or (x * x), but sometimes it can make a big difference (we had an example earlier this year, but I can't seem to find it now).
Finally found it: http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/haskell-cafe/2010-May/077862.html shows an example where the use of (x ^ 2) instead of (x * x) prevented sharing of a common subexpression, thus creating an O(2^n) algorithm from what rightfully was an O(n) algorithm.