forall a (Ord a => a-> a) -> Int is an illegal type???

Brian Hulley brianh at metamilk.com
Fri Feb 10 04:58:15 EST 2006


David Menendez wrote:
> Ben Rudiak-Gould writes:
>
>> Also, the rule would not be quite as simple as you make it out to be,
>> since
>>
>>      forall a. (forall b. Foo a b => a -> b) -> Int
>>
>> is a legal type, for example.
>
> Is it? GHCi gives me an error if I try typing a function like that.
>
>> {-# OPTIONS -fglasgow-exts #-}
>> class Foo a b
>>
>> f :: forall a. (forall b. Foo a b => a -> b) -> Int
>> f = undefined
>
>     No instance for (Foo a b)
>       arising from instantiating a type signature at x.hs:5:4-12
>     Probable fix: add (Foo a b) to the type signature(s) for `f'
>       Expected type: (forall b1. (Foo a b1) => a -> b1) -> Int
>       Inferred type: (a -> b) -> Int
>     In the definition of `f': f = undefined
>
> I think there would need to be a top-level constraint on |a| to
> guarantee that an instance of |Foo a b| exists, like
>
>     forall a. (exists c. Foo a c) =>
>         (forall b. Foo a b => a -> b) -> Int

Is "exists" enough to ensure that 'f' is given a dictionary that will work 
with all possible choices for 'b'?
I'd have thought it would need:

        forall a. (forall c. Foo a c) =>
            (forall b. Foo a b=> a->b)->Int

Regards, Brian.



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