[Haskell-beginners] FW: question

[Roelof Wobben]

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> Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2011 09:59:07 -0400
> Subject: Re: [Haskell-beginners] FW: question
> From: patrick.leboutillier at gmail.com
> To: edwards.benj at gmail.com
> CC: rwobben at hotmail.com; beginners at haskell.org
>
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2011 at 6:16 AM, Benjamin Edwards
> <edwards.benj at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi Roelof,
> >
> > I don't want to come across as rude here, and I am sure the rest of the list
> > will shoot me down if I do, but you had a number of people trying to
> > diagnose a problem caused mostly by a failure on your part to type out
> > correctly what you have read. You are going to find it very hard to make
> > meaningful progress in your quest to learn Haskell if you don't take the
> > time to at least learn the basic syntax of the language before coming to the
> > mailing lists for help.
>
> I agree, but here's something I'd like to point out:
>
> IIRC, Roelof uses "Programming in Haskell" as his learning material.
> One thing that I found confusing in that book (and in other books as
> well), is that the authors insist on using LaTeX mathematical symbols
> in Haskell code instead of "valid Haskell syntax". For example, in the
> exact example from the book that Roelof is trying to understand:
>
> [x^2 | x <- [1..5]]
>
> , the caret ('^') is not a caret, it's "an arrow pointing upwards",
> and the ASCII arrow ("<-") is not an ASCII arrow composed of '<' and
> '-', but instead "a single-character arrow". A table at the end of the
> book (Appendix B) explains the correspondance, but that might not be
> immediately obvious.
>
> What are the benefits of having Haskell code samples (in a book
> specifically about learning Haskell) not being valid Haskell syntax?
> Why burden the beginner with the task of mentally translating these symbols?
>
>
> Patrick


 

Hello Patrick, 

 

You say it better then I could say it.

The initial question was about the difference between what you call Latex and Haskell symbols.

I must say that this book explains things better then the other books I tried.

 

Roelof