Hello Lian, I recently wrote a module for just this purpose. Here is the approach that I (and Edward Kmett) like to take: 1. Create a type class with an associated type representing elements whic have keys: {-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-} {-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-} class Ord (Key a) => HasKey a where type Key a :: * getKey :: a -> Key a 2. Write new data structures which utilize this type-class. import qualified Data.Map as OldMap data Map a = OldMap.Map (Key a) a insert :: HasKey a => a -> Map a -> Map a These structures are responsible for maintaining the key-value invariants (which can be tricky at times; be careful!) There are other approaches too; for example you can use a multiparameter type class with a functional dependency. "HasKey k a | a -> k" Unfortunately I am not aware of any standardized naming scheme for HasKey/getKey. Edward Excerpts from Lian Hung Hon's message of 2016-07-08 09:35:53 -0400:
Dear cafe,
What is the idiomatic way to "split" records into their natural keys and content in a data structure? For example, given a user:
data User = { username :: ByteString, hash :: ByteString, address :: Text, ... }
Using map, a first choice would be Map ByteString User, but this leads to duplication of the username. And it is possible to make mistakes, such as
insert "John" (User "Jane" ...
What does cafe think? Is there any pattern for this? This is probably just a small nit in the overall architecture, but I'm curious to know the clean way to do it.
Regards, Hon