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GHC 7.8.1 released

haskell.org

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Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#41

Post by Buttons840 »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

I recommend the 99 Haskel problems: http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/H-99:_Ninety-Nine_Haskell...

All questions have solutions you can learn from; most have multiple solutions. I have learned a lot from doing these problems and doing additional research where needed.

(This is in addition to the other good learning resources like the oft mentioned LYAH.)

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#42

Post by SkyMarshal »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

Miran Lipovaca's LYAH is one of the best intro to programming, not just intro to Haskell, books I've read. He's great at explaining complicated technical concepts clearly.

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#43

Post by chc »

thinkpad20 wrote: post #19
Osmium wrote: post #2

I'm intrigued by "full iOS support." Does this mean it's now possible to write iOS apps using a Haskell backend?

I'm also intrigued. How would one program for iOS in a practical sense with Haskell? A great deal of iOS programming, as I understand it, is navigating the APIs and libraries provided by the SDK... is this a simple task in Haskell? The FFI is something I haven't really dealt with much yet. I guess people could/will start writing wrapper libraries?

I think the idea is that you would use the standard tools for the edges of the program with a Haskell core underneath handling the thinky bits. (I have no experience at all doing this, but it seems like the natural use case.)

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#44

Post by nnq »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

I sincerely recommend against LYAH! It takes sooooooooo loooooong to get to the interesting bits that actually make Haskell worth learning an has so many try-to-be-funny examples that it makes you run away screaming... I tried going through it but it was literally oscillating between putting my mind to sleep and making wish to grab a chainsaw :) And the "humor" and "pretty pictures" don't help either... they were more like poignant guide to ruby, something that you either love or they annoy the hel out of you (this was for me), but either way they don't help the learning experience at all.

I suggest HFH ("Haskell Fast & Hard") as the introductory tutorial to start with instead. You can pick from 2 formats:

- http://yannesposito.com/Scratch/en/blog/Haskell-the-Hard-Way... - static all-in-one-page format with pretty pictures

- https://www.fpcomplete.com/school/to-infinity-and-beyond/pic... - split version, but with the ability to open snippets in their web based IDE

...after this, Real World Haskell is probably the next step: http://book.realworldhaskell.org/read/ (I'm still at this step).

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#45

Post by chc »

gregschlom wrote: post #40
lucian1900 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the problem is that iOS APIs tend to be Objective-C, which is somewhat harder to wrap in Haskell.

Not really, it's quite easy to call Objective-C methods (or more correctly, to send messages to Objective-C selectors) and perform other Objective-C-related tasks from C. See: https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Cocoa/... This is actually what the Objective-C compiler does. It translates your Objective-C code to C method calls.

It's not that easy. I mean, just sending a message could entail one of objc_msgSend, obj_msgSend_stret or objc_msgSend_fpret, and which one you want to use is not always as clear-cut as you might prefer (http://www.sealiesoftware.com/blog/archive/2008/10/30/objc_e...). And then there's the hassle of defining classes dynamically, which entails six function calls just to create a class with one empty method, and one of those essential functions is not actually provided for you AFAIK unless you're using Apple's compiler where it's a builtin, so you'll need to write it yourself.

It's not ridiculously hard, but it's somewhat less easy than normal C FFI.

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#46

Post by tavoe »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

To me, the core of Haskell is that: "Haskell is C with one semi-colon per function."

This forces you to put all your code into method signatures. This, in turn, means Haskell (or C, if you follow the 1 semicolon rule in C) can understand almost everything about your program.

If you actually follow the 1 semicolon rule in C, you'll get very verbose syntax. All of Haskell's syntax is in service of making programming in this style palatable.

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#47

Post by coolsunglasses »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

If you want an alternative opinion from somebody who

1. Has taught a lot of Haskell

2. Thinks LYAH is better as a reference than a step-by-step method for learning Haskell

Then see my Learning Haskell gist here (it includes Haskell Fast & Hard, and other things too).

https://gist.github.com/bitemyapp/8739525

If anybody is learning Haskell and needs help, please email me.

Edit: I agree with nnq, I think LYAH moves too slowly and fails to show you what about Haskell is truly different and worthwhile in a compact enough format. That said, it is great as a reference as the explanations of concepts are stand-alone. (unlike RWH which is more project-oriented)

Edit2: You are going to feel a bit lost after Haskell Fast & Hard. This is natural. That's why I have you do the NICTA course. It firms things up.

Edit3: I think RWH is a great reference as well, but the mid-to-late chapters have a bit of an "in media res" thing going on because there are projects being walked through cross-chapter. That said, it has a very nice and simple example of, "pre-monads, ugly code; post-monads, pretty code". RWH also covers topics that you'll care about if you're doing Haskell in production.

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#48

Post by dllthomas »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

No one's mentioned the wikibook. I've not read through it much, but a colleague found it far more readable than LYAH: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Haskell (I loved LYAH myself, though, so YMWillProbablyV).

Also, there's no substitute for talking to people. Hop on the Haskell Beginners mailing list (http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/beginners) or drop by the IRC channel (#haskell on freenode), where people couldn't be friendlier.

Re: GHC 7.8.1 released

#50

Post by freyrs3 »

tel wrote: post #31
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #21

I really want to get into Haskell, but I just don't understand it. The tutorial on the official site doesn't do it for me. Can anyone suggest alternative resources for learning? I'm used to C-like languages. Thanks for all the responses. I'll start with LYAH.

Others have linked tutorials. I'm going to leave some advice: pretend like you're learning to program from scratch. Not just mentally but in how you invest. It will likely take some amount of time, it will likely happen in stages of progressively receding complete astonishment and confusion, and you will be served to be proud of silly things like getting simple programs to even compile. Sounds kind of miserable, righ…

This is most certainly the best advice you can give to someone coming from other languages. I constantly see people I very much respect for their skills in other programming disciplines get very angry and make otherwise irrational rants about Haskell because they can't translate their hard won skills over to this new model. Learning Haskell will make one feel like a beginner again, should just embrace that from the start.
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