Revamping the numeric classes

[Ketil Malde]

Dylan Thurston <dpt@math.harvard.edu> writes:

> On Wed, Feb 07, 2001 at 01:57:41PM -0500, Dylan Thurston wrote:
> > ... One point that has not been made: given a class
> > setup like
> >  <deleted>
> > then naive users can continue to use (Num a) in contexts, and the same
> > programs will continue to work.

> I take that back.  Instance declarations would change, so this isn't
> a very conservative change.

Would it be a terribly grave change to the language to allow leaf
class instance declarations to include the necessary definitions for
dependent classes?  E.g.

        class foo a where
                f :: ...

        class (foo a) => bar a where
                b :: ...

        instance bar T where
                f = ...
                b = ...

-kzm
-- 
If I haven't seen further, it is by standing in the footprints of giants