Adrian Hey wrote:
I think all occurences of [] have type forall a. [a]
The case expression..
case a of
(a':as) -> <expr1>
[] -> <expr2>
Should be typed as if written..
case a of
(a':as) -> let a=(a':as) in <expr1>
[] -> let a=[] in <expr2>
----------------------------------------------------
Well, we will have to agree to disagree, I find the
current system makes perfect sense, and is easy to
reason with. If I want a let binding I can write one.
The difference is really this:
case a of
(a:as) -> <expr1>
e -> e
In this case e represent 'the same []' as on the left hand
side.
in the let binding this is a new and fresh '[]'...
When I pattern match a variable in a case extression
I really expect it to get the type of the case...
There are circunstances when I go on to use e, and if
it is not grounded by the case expression I will get
hit by the monomorphoism restriction, and have to
add non haskell98 type annotation to ground 'e'...
for example If I pass e to a polymorphic function, it
won't know what type e has...
case a of
(a':as) -> let a=(a':as) in <expr1>
[] -> let a=[] in (polyfn a)
where polyfn a has a type like
polyfna :: Ord a -> [a] -> String
Now the above won't work and you will have to do:
[] -> let a=[] in (polyfn (a :: [SomeListType]))
and of course if you are using generics then how can
polyfn get the original type of 'a' in the case expression...
for example:
polyfn :: Typable a -> [a] -> ShowS
polyfn a = shows (typeOf a)
then:
case a of
(a:as) -> <expr1>
e -> polyfn e
is correct, but:
case a of
(a':as) -> let a=(a':as) in <expr1>
[] -> let a=[] in (polyfn a)
does what?
Keean.
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