[Haskell-cafe] Question concerning datatype "Either"

Bayley, Alistair Alistair.Bayley at invesco.com
Fri Jul 4 05:22:14 EDT 2008


> From: haskell-cafe-bounces at haskell.org 
> [mailto:haskell-cafe-bounces at haskell.org] On Behalf Of phy51km4n
> 
> Why does that not work? :
> 
> fromTuple (One   a)       =  a
> fromTuple (Two   a b)     = (a, b)
> fromTuple (Three a b c)   = (a, b, c)
> fromTuple (Four  a b c d) = (a, b, c, d)

Have you tried it? What are the types of the various cases in fromTuple
(you can rename them to get ghci to accept them as separate functions):

fromTuple1 :: Tuple a b c d -> a
fromTuple1 (One a) = a

fromTuple2 :: Tuple a b c d -> ???
fromTuple2 (Two a b) = (a, b)


> Why is this correct? :
> 
> fromTuple (One   a )      = Left  (Left   a)
> fromTuple (Two   a b )    = Left  (Right (a,b))
> fromTuple (Three a b c )  = Right (Left  (a,b,c))
> fromTuple (Four  a b c d) = Right (Right (a,b,c,d))

Again, what is the type of just this line?

fromTuple (One   a )      = Left  (Left   a)

and this line?

fromTuple (Two   a b )    = Left  (Right (a,b))

And if you combine them?

fromTuple :: Tuple a b c d -> ???
fromTuple (One   a )      = Left  (Left   a)
fromTuple (Two   a b )    = Left  (Right (a,b))

(You should see that Either's type parameters are progressively
filled-in as you add more cases.)

Alistair
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