Data.HashTable and duplicate keys

[Simon Marlow]

On 28 September 2004 12:49, George Russell wrote:

> Einar wrote (snipped):
>  > I recently noticed that Data.HashTable silently
>  > accepts duplicate keys and keeps all the values.
>  > This is very counterintuitive from the interface
>  > and makes updating a hashtable quite tedious
>  > (lookup + delete + insert).
> 
> Gosh, I'm glad *someone* told me of this bizarre behaviour.
> Why on earth hash tables should mimic association lists of
> all things is a mystery to me.  (Should GHC also insert
> delay loops to simulate their poor performance?)
> 
> Sigh, off I go to fix my code.  Just as well I only use
> hash tables in one place.

Making insert do delete+insert is pretty inefficient if you know that
the key isn't in the table.  Providing update (==delete+insert) seems a
reasonable solution, no?

Cheers,
	Simon