[Haskell-cafe] about Haskell code written to be "too smart"

[wren ng thornton]

Colin Adams wrote:
> 2009/3/25 wren ng thornton <wren at freegeek.org>:
> > >  Most of the "documentation" is in research papers, and a "normal"
> > >  programmer don't want to read these papers.
> >
> > Yes, and no. There is quite a bit of documentation in research papers, and
> > mainstream programmers don't read research. However, this is a big part of
> > what makes the Haskell community what it is. There are plenty of
> > non-academics here, but they have the willingness to read these papers (even
> > if it's out of the ordinary) and the desire to learn radical new things
> > (because they're out of the ordinary).
> 
> Yes.
> BUT ...
> 
> when I look up the Haddock-generated documentation for a function, I
> DON'T appreciate it if that is in the form of a hyperlink to a
> research paper.
> And that occurs in several of the libraries shipped with GHC for instance.
> 
> A reference to a research paper is fine to show where the ideas came
> from, but that is not where the library documentation should be.


Yeah, that's bad. 'Documentation' like that should be corrected with 
Extreme Prejudice.

-- 
Live well,
~wren