[Haskell-cafe] ANNOUNCE: vector-bytestring-0.0.0.0

Tue Oct 18 02:30:03 CEST 2011

On 15 October 2011 23:18, Ivan Lazar Miljenovic
<ivan.miljenovic at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 16 October 2011 01:15, Bas van Dijk <v.dijk.bas at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I agree that you shouldn't use ByteStrings or Vectors of Word8s for
>> Unicode strings. However I can imagine that for quick sessions in ghci
>> it can be quite handy if they are shown as strings. For example,
>> currently we have:
>>
>>> import Network.HTTP.Enumerator
>>> simpleHttp "http://code.haskell.org/~basvandijk/"
>> Chunk "<html>\n<head><title>Bas van
>> Dijk</title></head>\n<body>\n<h1>Bas van Dijk</h1>\n\n<p>Email: <a
>> href=\"mailto://v.dijk.bas@gmail.com\">v.dijk.bas at gmail.com</a></p>\n\n<p>Nick
>> on IRC: <tt>basvandijk</tt></p>\n\n<a
>> href=\"http://www.haskellers.com/user/basvandijk/\">\n  <img
>> src=\"http://www.haskellers.com/static/badge.png\" \n       alt=\"I'm
>> a Haskeller\"\n       border=\"0\">\n</a>\n\n<p>See my <a
>> href=\"https://github.com/basvandijk\">GitHub</a> page for a list of
>> projects I work on.</p>\n\n</body>\n</html>\n" Empty
>>
>> If ByteStrings were not shown as strings this would look like:
>>
>> Chunk ( fromList
>> [60,104,116,109,108,62,10,60,104,101,97,100,62,60,116,105,116,108,101,62,66,97,115,32,118,97,110,32,68,105,106,107,60,47,116,105,116,108,101,62,60,47,104,101,97,100,62,10,60,98,111,100,121,62,10,60,104,49,62,66,97,115,32,118,97,110,32,68,105,106,107,60,47,104,49,62,10,10,60,112,62,69,109,97,105,108,58,32,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,109,97,105,108,116,111,58,47,47,118,46,100,105,106,107,46,98,97,115,64,103,109,97,105,108,46,99,111,109,34,62,118,46,100,105,106,107,46,98,97,115,64,103,109,97,105,108,46,99,111,109,60,47,97,62,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,112,62,78,105,99,107,32,111,110,32,73,82,67,58,32,60,116,116,62,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,60,47,116,116,62,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,104,116,116,112,58,47,47,119,119,119,46,104,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,115,46,99,111,109,47,117,115,101,114,47,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,47,34,62,10,32,32,60,105,109,103,32,115,114,99,61,34,104,116,116,112,58,47,47,119,119,119,46,104,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,115,46,99,111,109,47,115,116,97,116,105,99,47,98,97,100,103,101,46,112,110,103,34,32,10,32,32,32,32,32,32,32,97,108,116,61,34,73,39,109,32,97,32,72,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,34,10,32,32,32,32,32,32,32,98,111,114,100,101,114,61,34,48,34,62,10,60,47,97,62,10,10,60,112,62,83,101,101,32,109,121,32,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,104,116,116,112,115,58,47,47,103,105,116,104,117,98,46,99,111,109,47,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,34,62,71,105,116,72,117,98,60,47,97,62,32,112,97,103,101,32,102,111,114,32,97,32,108,105,115,116,32,111,102,32,112,114,111,106,101,99,116,115,32,73,32,119,111,114,107,32,111,110,46,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,47,98,111,100,121,62,10,60,47,104,116,109,108,62,10])
>> Empty
>>
>> Personally, I don't work in ghci that often so I don't care that much
>> if we have or don't have specialized Show instances for Vectors of
>> Word8s.
>>
>> So what do other people think about this?
>
> Actually, for my current use case of Bytestrings (binary encoding of
> graphs using existing encoding schemes), I would prefer this
> [Word8]-based Show instance as it would help with my debugging, since
> the output looks along the lines of: Chunk (fromList
> [3,2,3,0,3,1,3,0,2,2,1,0]).  I am the first to admit that my use case
> is probably different from others though.
>

And I often work with mixed text/binary data (eg. text annotations in
video streams). I'd want the Show/Read instances to be in the form of
a hexdump with char representation alongside (like xxd or od -xc
output). It roundtrips well, so why not? :-)

Conrad.