because that would imply you could use the record update syntax which you cannot do in haskell. as in: xs = [1,2,3] ys = xs {head = 4} -- bad code John On Wed, Apr 09, 2003 at 11:10:14AM +0100, Jon Fairbairn wrote:

Is there any reason why the list type is defined in the Report as

data [a] = [] | a : [a] deriving (Eq, Ord)

rather than

data [a] = [] | (:) {head:: a, tail:: [a]} deriving (Eq, Ord)

(which would shorten Prelude.List somewhat)?

-- Jón Fairbairn Jon.Fairbairn@cl.cam.ac.uk 31 Chalmers Road jf@cl.cam.ac.uk Cambridge CB1 3SZ +44 1223 570179 (after 14:00 only, please!)

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