[Haskell-cafe] How to use STArray?

[Bayley, Alistair]

Hello all,

I have a pure function which uses immutable arrays from Data.Array, but it
spends about 95% of its time doing array updates. The arrays are used in a
single-threaded manner (no need for the old values after an array update),
and the arrays are not returned; just one of the elements. So I want to
convert it to use STArray, to see if there's a performance gain, but it's
not clear how I should tie everything together. I'm believe I don't want to
use runSTArray, because I'm not interested in getting an array back from the
pure function - just one of the elements.


Here's an contrived example:

module Main where
import Data.Array.ST
import Control.Monad.ST

main = print (compute 5)

compute :: Int -> Int
compute n = runST ( do
    arr <- newArray (-1, 1) n
    readArray 1 arr
  )


to which GHC responds: 

    No instance for (MArray a Int (ST s))
      arising from use of `readArray' at test.hs:11:4-12
    Probable fix:
      add (MArray a Int (ST s)) to the expected type of an expression
      or add an instance declaration for (MArray a Int (ST s))
    In the result of a 'do' expression: readArray 1 arr
    In the first argument of `runST', namely
        `(do
            arr <- newArray (- 1, 1) n
            readArray 1 arr)'
    In the definition of `compute':
        compute n = runST (do
                             arr <- newArray (- 1, 1) n
                             readArray 1 arr)


Alistair

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