[Haskell-cafe] Newbie question

[Richard O'Keefe]

The definition

last [] = []

was a bad move.  Warnings about unhandled alternatives
are only that, WARNINGS.  Something like this is quite
definitely wrong.  We want
  last [1,2,3] ===> 3
but last [] = [] says that last can only return lists.

It's OK to say "this is not defined".
It's OK to say "this is an error case".
It's not OK to make stuff up that does not fit.

last [] = undefined
last (x:xs) = last' x xs

or

last [] = error "last []"
last (x:xs) = last' x xs

let you assure the compiler (and your readers)
that you *have* considered this case; you didn't
just forget about it.  They also do not constrain
the result type in any way, so they don't
interfere with the rest of the definition.

The meaning of last' x xs is
"last' x xs is the last element of [x]++xs"
and you can figure that out for yourself with a
simple case analysis on xs.

A hint on reading exercises in functional programming books:
"make a function F that ..." almost NEVER means
"make a function F that ... without even thinking about
introducing any helper functions."  When defining last,
introducing last' is OK.  You can make it local if you want:

last (x:xs) = last' x xs
  where last' x (y:ys) = ...
        last' x []     = ...
last [] = error "last []"

although you don't need to.
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