[Haskell-cafe] New type of ($) operator in GHC 8.0 is problematic

[Omari Norman]

On Fri, Feb 5, 2016 at 2:46 PM, Kyle Hanson <me at khanson.io> wrote:

> I think its important to identify who you want your "customers" to be. If
> you only want the most advanced type theorists to use the language, that is
> perfectly fine, but what you lose are thousands of developers that can
> benefit the Haskell community without having to know advanced Typing.
>
> Needing a "Beginners" mode in a language is *not* a feature, its a
> fundamental design flaw. It shows that the language was not sufficiently
> thought out and designed for everyone.
>
> Its extremely important to not lose touch with the people that make the
> community; the newcomers. Sacrificing the 99% of beginner and intermediate
> haskellers for the 1%, I believe is a step in the wrong direction.
>
>
I'm sympathetic, but the same arguments were made against the
Foldable-Traversable Proposal. See for instance

http://neilmitchell.blogspot.com/2014/10/why-traversablefoldable-should-not-be.html

Since that wound up going in, I think this ship has sailed.  Types are
going to become increasingly polymorphic in the Prelude.  Though I wish
this weren't so I've come to accept it, and I doubt attacking it head on is
going to get anywhere.
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