String != [Char]

[Gabriel Dos Reis]

On Sat, Mar 24, 2012 at 10:19 PM, Greg Weber <greg at gregweber.info> wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 24, 2012 at 7:26 PM, Gabriel Dos Reis
> <gdr at integrable-solutions.net> wrote:
>> On Sat, Mar 24, 2012 at 9:09 PM, Greg Weber <greg at gregweber.info> wrote:
>
>>> Problem: we want to write beautiful (and possibly inefficient) code
>>> that is easy to explain. If nothing else, this is pedagologically
>>> important.
>>> The goals of this code are to:
>>>  * use list processing pattern matching and functions on a string type
>>
>> I may have missed this question so I will ask it (apologies if it is a
>> repeat):  Why is it believed that list processing pattern matching is
>> appropriate or the right tool for text processing?
>
> Nobody said it is the right tool for text processing. In fact, I think
> we all agreed it is the wrong tool for many cases.

Hmm, I would have thought that would be enough reasons not
to use that method -- "wrong methods" are hard to unlearn
and to get rid of.

> But it is easy for  students to understand since they are already being taught to use
> lists for everything else.

Perhaps we are underestimating their competences  and are complicating
their lives unnecessarily...

> It would be great if you can talk with
> teachers of Haskell and figure out a better way to teach text
> processing.

my suspicion is teachers of Haskell would want designers
of Haskell to make the good datatype for text the default :-) :-)

-- Gaby