>We could as well use the Monoid list implementation for ZipLists.

We could, but that would be redundant and wouldn't fit what ZipList is for as well.


On Sat, Jul 25, 2015 at 3:57 PM, Henning Thielemann <lemming@henning-thielemann.de> wrote:


On Sat, 25 Jul 2015, Christopher Allen wrote:

http://hackage.haskell.org/package/base-4.8.1.0/docs/Control-Applicative.html#t:ZipList

There's a Monoid that matches what the Applicative for ZipList does that seems to be missing.

instance Monoid a => Monoid (ZipList a) where
  mempty  = pure mempty
  mappend = liftA2 mappend

It's been brought up before:

https://mail.haskell.org/pipermail/haskell-cafe/2009-October/067861.html

Not only is it useful when it's the Monoid you want, but it serves an educational purpose for highlighting the relationship between Monoid and Applicative as well.

Are there any good reasons not to have it?

The Monoid instance for lists is not related to Applicative list instance - so why should the instances for ZipList? We could as well use the Monoid list implementation for ZipLists. If there is no actual application for the instance I would leave it unimplemented.



--
Chris Allen
Currently working on http://haskellbook.com