Haskell Platform Proposal: add the 'text' library

[Bryan O'Sullivan]

On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 1:12 PM, Malcolm Wallace <malcolm.wallace at me.com>wrote:

> I have myself in the past implemented a Text-like library as a replacement
> for the standard list-of-char representation.  (Before you ask, it is not
> publically releasable.)  The basic decision I took there was that the Char
> type does not exist - the only thing available is Text.  Another way of
> saying this, is that Char is simply the subset of all the Texts of size 1.
>  I am not suggesting that the Prelude or ByteString should take this view,
> but if you proceed to look at the type signatures of the Data.Text package
> on the basis that Char/Text are the "same" thing, then it may become clearer
> how to resolve the apparent name/type clashes below.
>

Thanks, Malcolm. I do like this principle, and I'm comfortable with its
implied further divergence from list/bytestring.

The breakSubstring functionality is semantically:
>
>    breakSubstring x = break (==x)
> although there may be a more efficient implementation.
> Proposal: rename Text.break to Text.breakSubstring, and Text.breakBy to
> Text.break.


So far, I've been proceeding on the basis that I'd like naming to be
consistent and descriptive, and to have more commonly used functions get
shorter names than their less commonly used (but possibly more general)
cousins. For instance, breakSubstring is descriptive, and it's consistent
with bytestring, but it's much longer than break, even though breaking on a
fixed string is more common. In this case, length and frequency of use trump
the other considerations in my mind.


>  breakEnd    -         -              Text -> Text -> (Text, Text)
>> -           -         breakEnd       (Char -> Bool) -> Text -> (Text,
>> Text)
>>
>
>  breakEnd    -         breakEnd       (Text -> Bool) -> Text -> (Text,
> Text)
>
> Proposal: slightly generalise the type of Text.breakEnd.


I think that these generalisations are good ideas. Can someone else please
weigh in, preferably the original authors of the H-P inclusion draft (Don,
Johan)?

findBy      find      find           (Char -> Bool) -> Text -> Maybe Char
>
>
>  find        find      find           (Text -> Bool) -> Text -> Maybe Text
>
> Proposal: rename Text.findBy to Text.find.


I agree with the change of type, not so much with the naming. That's roughly
my stance in the other cases, too.


> I hope this is a useful contribution, if only to spark other ideas for how
> to resolve the impasse.
>

Definitely, thank you.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/libraries/attachments/20101017/c11737c1/attachment.html