Re: [Haskell-beginners] PHP vs Haskell... a challenge!
Thank you everybody for your responses, I am going to print them out and study them hard, particularly the use of left folds. I think I skipped that in RWH book... .I need to go back and re-cover the basic again I think... it's a tendency of mine to graze through stuff picking up what I need and sometimes you just can't beat learning the basics. As a still beginner after about eight months of (somewhat intermittent) usage I would say that in order to truly get to grips with Haskell as a concept let alone a language you need to know and understand ... * currying, which helped me to truly understand the signature notation used, a -> b -> c etc. I have used haXe, which is written in ocaml, and the notation is the same but now makes more sense! * function composition leading to point-less notation, this is better understood the currying penny has dropped * lazy versus strict evaluation and the concept of lazy I/O and why it can sometimes leave you scratching your head for a while!! LMAO! :) * monads: of course, for me the best video I've seen is this one. As a reluctant Drupal/PHP developer and wannabe FP developer for about six years now, each time I find myself coding some rubbish or other in PHP I have lots of 'ahah!' moments as I think that it would be nice to be able to express some idiom or form more succinctly in PHP and then I realise what X Y or Z is for in Haskell... that's the upside, the downside is I then have to continue the job in PHP! Thanks again, Sean.
Good morning,
...hang in there, it's a long learning curve...I too am trying to figure out
if you can make money with Haskell or F#...[I'm an independent software
consultant]...
...I picked up a copy of "Category Theory" by Steve Awodey - it supposedly
is geared to Computer Scientists and not Mathemeticians - but I couldn't
understand it and my math is pretty good
[...and I've had 4 years of college math]
...btw: did you neglect to include the link for 'monad:...the best video
I've seen is this one' - could you please provide it.
Good weekend
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sean Charles"
Thank you everybody for your responses, I am going to print them out and study them hard, particularly the use of left folds. I think I skipped that in RWH book... .I need to go back and re-cover the basic again I think... it's a tendency of mine to graze through stuff picking up what I need and sometimes you just can't beat learning the basics.
As a still beginner after about eight months of (somewhat intermittent) usage I would say that in order to truly get to grips with Haskell as a concept let alone a language you need to know and understand ...
* currying, which helped me to truly understand the signature notation used, a -> b -> c etc. I have used haXe, which is written in ocaml, and the notation is the same but now makes more sense!
* function composition leading to point-less notation, this is better understood the currying penny has dropped
* lazy versus strict evaluation and the concept of lazy I/O and why it can sometimes leave you scratching your head for a while!! LMAO! :)
* monads: of course, for me the best video I've seen is this one.
As a reluctant Drupal/PHP developer and wannabe FP developer for about six years now, each time I find myself coding some rubbish or other in PHP I have lots of 'ahah!' moments as I think that it would be nice to be able to express some idiom or form more succinctly in PHP and then I realise what X Y or Z is for in Haskell... that's the upside, the downside is I then have to continue the job in PHP!
Thanks again, Sean.
_______________________________________________ Beginners mailing list Beginners@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/beginners
Good morning, ...hang in there, it's a long learning curve...I too am trying to figure out if you can make money with Haskell or F#...[I'm an independent software consultant]... Me too. When I am working. I am still figuring out if I can make money
On 18/03/11 12:44, Patrick Lynch wrote: period!
...I picked up a copy of "Category Theory" by Steve Awodey - it supposedly is geared to Computer Scientists and not Mathemeticians - but I couldn't understand it and my math is pretty good [...and I've had 4 years of college math] I bought "Purely function data structures" by Chris Okasaki and "The Road to Logic..." and the yare both now i nthe bookshelf impressing visitors. LMAO
...btw: did you neglect to include the link for 'monad:...the best video I've seen is this one' - could you please provide it.
Curses, the link! Yes, the video is called "Don't fear the Monad" http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Going+Deep/Brian-Beckman-Dont-fear-the-Monads His method of explanation, reasoning and re-visiting the previous concepts is really really good. It helped me a lot, that's not to say I don't fnid myself fighting the compiler a lot but at least I know *why* I goofed if not how to fix it yet. Understanding monads is so important in Haskell, I would say that it is, IMO, the single biggest reason that it will never become truly mainstream as it's too far up the BLUB scale for most people who cut code for a living. I was thinking of rewriting the Boom Town Rats song "I don't link Mondays" to "I don't like Monads" to see if it could help reinforce some concepts. Then I sobered up! ;)
Understanding monads is so important in Haskell, I would say that it is, IMO, the single biggest reason that it will never become truly mainstream as it's too far up the BLUB scale for most people who cut code for a living.
I see you have your crystal ball out. Those have always been so reliable. ;)
On 18/03/11 13:44, Brian Shannon wrote:
Understanding monads is so important in Haskell, I would say that it is, IMO, the single biggest reason that it will never become truly mainstream as it's too far up the BLUB scale for most people who cut code for a living. I see you have your crystal ball out. Those have always been so reliable. ;) Yeah. I also predicted last weeks lottery numbers which is why I now only work for fun.
Not. :( I always ask people this question when money comes up, "If your physical needs were met (house,food etc.), what would you do for the rest of your life ?" I suspect that a very long time ago back in the dark ages, we discovered that human life is ultimately pointless and so 'money' was invented to create a bias and then 'consumerism' gives most western people something to take their minds of the futility of it all. IMHO anyway. :)
Good morning,
Thanks for the link
http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Going+Deep/Brian-Beckman-Dont-fear-the-Monads
I saw it a while back but forgot about it...
I viewed it again and it made a lot more sense...
I'm sure I'll view it a dozen more times now...it is exactly what I am
looking for...
Category Theory itself has, so far, defeated me...but I'm starting to
understand Monads...
I tried reading "Category Theory" by Steve Awodey, which is aimed at
Computer Scientists, etal and not Mathemeticians - but found it to be too
abstract...
I ordered the following - they have all been highly recommended...I'll let
you know:
"Types and Programming Languages" by Benjamin C. Pierce
"Basic Category Theory for Computer Scientists (Foundations of Computing)"
by Benjamin C. Pierce
"Categories and Computer Science (Cambridge Computer Science Texts)" by
R. F. C. Walters
As mentioned, I am a long-time software consultant [30+ years] and I now
have the luxary of taking off some time and doing some independent research
on FP...
I've been studying Haskell and have implemented Hugs and Ghci on Windows and
on an Imac...
Surprisingly, I found the Windows installations to be significantly
easier...On Windows I'm using WinGhci and WinHugs...and WinVi32...
I wish that there was a Haskell editor but WinVi32 works well...
I was able to install the DB on Windows and got it to work, using "Real
World Haskell" as a reference...
I've been unable to get TK installed on Windows...spent about a week trying
and finally gave up...
I got interested in Haskell while working with an off-shore group that was
implementing a Asp VB.Net and C# project and another Ruby on Rails project
[it used Lamda Calculus and referenced Haskell].
I don' think that I'm going to make any money using Haskell but I suspect
that there is a developing market for F# and LINQ - which utilize Visual
Studio...
...so, I'll finish my Haskell study and hopefully will crack Monads and
possibly Category Theory and then switch over to F# and LINQ...
I took a quick look at F# and its syntax looks a bit rough...
I'll start my marketing effort in a few months and pass on any leads to you
that I find...
Good luck [to both of us]
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sean Charles"
Good morning, ...hang in there, it's a long learning curve...I too am trying to figure out if you can make money with Haskell or F#...[I'm an independent software consultant]... Me too. When I am working. I am still figuring out if I can make money
On 18/03/11 12:44, Patrick Lynch wrote: period!
...I picked up a copy of "Category Theory" by Steve Awodey - it supposedly is geared to Computer Scientists and not Mathemeticians - but I couldn't understand it and my math is pretty good [...and I've had 4 years of college math] I bought "Purely function data structures" by Chris Okasaki and "The Road to Logic..." and the yare both now i nthe bookshelf impressing visitors. LMAO
...btw: did you neglect to include the link for 'monad:...the best video I've seen is this one' - could you please provide it.
Curses, the link! Yes, the video is called "Don't fear the Monad" http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Going+Deep/Brian-Beckman-Dont-fear-the-Monads
His method of explanation, reasoning and re-visiting the previous concepts is really really good. It helped me a lot, that's not to say I don't fnid myself fighting the compiler a lot but at least I know *why* I goofed if not how to fix it yet.
Understanding monads is so important in Haskell, I would say that it is, IMO, the single biggest reason that it will never become truly mainstream as it's too far up the BLUB scale for most people who cut code for a living.
I was thinking of rewriting the Boom Town Rats song "I don't link Mondays" to "I don't like Monads" to see if it could help reinforce some concepts. Then I sobered up! ;)
participants (3)
-
Brian Shannon -
Patrick Lynch -
Sean Charles