IO monad and lazy evaluation

[Elke Kasimir]

On 22-May-2003 Glynn Clements wrote:
> The problem isn't monads, or lazy functions, or even the interactions
> between them. The problem is specifically lazy I/O, which is basically
> a fudge which usually works in simple cases.
> 
> The "normal" (i.e. strict) I/O functions are perfectly safe.

Since Haskell is lazy by default, I consider lazy file reading to be the more 
natural choice, and also a safe one on operating systems like unix who lock a 
copy of the file at the time it's opened, and given that such a copy almost 
always does not come at such a high cost. Unfortunately, the number of file hand
les is sometimes limited so that one is sometimes forced to close lazily read 
files explizitly which is rather tedious...

Elke Kasimir.

--  
Elke Kasimir                             EsPresto AG
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