[Haskell-cafe] New to Monads

[Christian Maeder]

Tom Hawkins wrote:
> I'm just starting to feel comfortable working inside IO; now I am trying 
> to wrap my head around Control.Monad.State.  Looking at the 
> implementation, I came across some unfamiliar syntax...
> 
> class (Monad m) => MonadState s m | m -> s where

For a simple state monad the class MonadState is only important to 
supply the functions set, get and (indirectly) modify and gets.

More important to note (and independent of MonadState) is:

   instance Monad (State s)

This instance is not directly displayed by the haddock documentation, 
only (indirectly):

   instance MonadState s (State s)

> With IO, I understand one your in it, you can't get out.  I.e., any 
> function that conducts IO must have IO _ in the type signature.

"IO" is kind of a hidden type constructor whereas

   newtype State s a = State { runState :: s -> (a, s) }

is fully known.

Maybe it helps to view the "type IO a" as "State RealWorld a" where 
"Realworld" is never exposed (and of course without "instance MonadState 
RealWorld IO").

Christian