[Haskell-cafe] Expanding do notation

[David F. Place]

On Jan 7, 2006, at 11:56 AM, Chris Kuklewicz wrote:

> This is all about lazy evaluation.

Actually, I understand about lazy evaluation.   What I don't  
understand is the extent of variable bindings.

If I desugar the code this far:

main = do n <- getArgs >>= return . read . head
	          main' n

main' n = let p = permutations [1..n]
	      		in do mapM_ (putStrLn . concatMap show) $ take 30 p
		    	          putStr $ "Pfannkuchen(" ++ show n ++ ") = "
		    	          putStrLn . show $ foldl' (flip (max . steps 0)) 0 p


'p' is a variable bound by a normal 'let.'   Why isn't 'p' kept  
around until the whole 'in' expression is evaluated?  If it were,  
then I assume the GC would be obliged to copy everything it pointed to.
In the original version, the author called 'permutations' twice and  
didn't create a variable binding.

Cheers, David

--------------------------------
David F. Place
mailto:d at vidplace.com