As Derek has pointed out, I'm yet far from reaching a point where I should worry about that :)
_If_ you understand Haskell but not monads, I think it is entirely legitimate to start with the implementation and then proceed to the uses. A bottom-up approach instead of a top-down approach. This is the approach of Will Partain's old 'country boys guide to monads' (which I can't find a copy of). He started with examples of non-monadic code where you couldn't see what was going on because of all the 'plumbing' required to make sure you had a supply of fresh names here and a current substitution there and showed how a monad could cleanup the plumbing. Of course, this only works if you've written enough of the right kind of code that the examples make sense... -- Alastair Reid www.haskell-consulting.com