[Haskell-cafe] State of OOP in Haskell

[Donald Bruce Stewart]

deliverable:
> ...In the tradition of the "letters of an ignorant newbie"...
> 
> What's the consensus on the OOP in Haskell *now*?  There're some
> libraries such as OOHaskell, O'Haskell, and Haskell~98's own qualified
> type system with inheritance.
> 
> If I have GHC, which way to do anything OOP-like is considered "right" 
> today?

Using existentials and typeclasses to do some OO things wouldn't be
considered unidiomatic (particularly, using existentials to package up
interfaces to values).

In general though, using a functional approach will produce better
(simpler) Haskell code, and make it more likely others will understand it.
Personally, I run in fear from OO Haskell ;)

Concrete examples of when you think you need an OO feature might be
useful, so people can discuss the more FP solutions to the same problem.

Cheers,
  Don