See if you can find some interesting open-source Haskell projects that involve the sort of "real-world" code you're interested in, and see if you can fix some small bugs, improve the documentation, etc. That will give you some practice writing real code, but it's ten times easier if you don't have to start absolutely from scratch. -Brent On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 05:29:08PM +0000, Kelleher, Kevin wrote:

After more than two decades using the C-family of languages (C, C++, Java, C#, Perl, unix shells), I've been trying to learn Haskell. Each time I've begun with enthusiasm, and eventually run out of gas before I've gotten to writing real code. Haskell's learning curve is not very steep, but it is very long. I haven't yet gotten to the things I do the most, which all involve side-effects: mostly actions on directories and files, as well as calls to system utilities or other pieces of software.

I'm working my way through "Real Life Haskell" and watching Erick Meijer's lectures, but I'm beginning to fear I'll run out of gas again if I can't write some programs that touch the real world.

Are there any tutorials or other material that will get me going in that area?

thanks,

Kevin

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Hello Kevin, In conjunction with general haskell tutorials, you might be interested in the following libraries on hackage: * shelly - convenience functions for systems programming * hsshellscript - similar * system-filepath - high-level interface for manipulating directories * shqq - run shell commands using quasi-quoting, like perl's backtick operator * process - spawn external commands (supplying command name, arguments, environment variables, etc These are mostly under category 'System' on hackage, here: http://hackage.haskell.org/packages/archive/pkg-list.html#cat:system There are many other libraries that facilitate interacting with the OS (especially if the OS is Unix), if you browse around hackage. Additionally, the System.Posix.* modules provide direct bindings to POSIX services (fork, nice, setenv, semaphores, shared memory, and so on), if that's what you need. StackOverflow is pretty good for finding example code for "how do I do X in Haskell", so by all means search there as well. I've found that writing "shell scripts" or small unix tools in Haskell is a bit slower at first than writing them in, say, perl, but the payoff in 1) avoiding bugs and 2) maintainability is gigantic. Give it a try -- you may be impressed. These days I turn to haskell for all but the smallest of scripts. Good luck on your quest. On Fri, Jun 14, 2013 at 05:29:08PM +0000, Kelleher, Kevin wrote:

After more than two decades using the C-family of languages (C, C++, Java, C#, Perl, unix shells), I've been trying to learn Haskell. Each time I've begun with enthusiasm, and eventually run out of gas before I've gotten to writing real code. Haskell's learning curve is not very steep, but it is very long. I haven't yet gotten to the things I do the most, which all involve side-effects: mostly actions on directories and files, as well as calls to system utilities or other pieces of software.

I'm working my way through "Real Life Haskell" and watching Erick Meijer's lectures, but I'm beginning to fear I'll run out of gas again if I can't write some programs that touch the real world.

Are there any tutorials or other material that will get me going in that area?

thanks,

Kevin

This message (including any attachments) is intended only for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is non-public, proprietary, privileged, confidential, and exempt from disclosure under applicable law or may constitute as attorney work product. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any use, dissemination, distribution, or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, notify us immediately by telephone and (i) destroy this message if a facsimile or (ii) delete this message immediately if this is an electronic communication.

Thank you.

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