On 2006-02-04 at 21:15GMT "Brian Hulley" wrote: > Stefan Holdermans wrote: > > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > > Hash: SHA1 > > > > Brian wrote: > > > >> I think the mystery surrounding :: and : might have been that > >> originally people thought type annotations would hardly ever be > >> needed whereas list cons is often needed, but now that it is > >> regarded as good practice to put a type annotation before every top > >> level value binding, and as the type system becomes more and more > >> complex (eg with GADTs etc), type annotations are now presumably far > >> more common than list cons so it would be good if Haskell Prime > >> would swap these operators back to their de facto universal > >> inter-language standard of list cons and type annotation > >> respectively. > > > > I don't think Haskell Prime should be about changing the look and > > feel of the language. > > Perhaps it is just a matter of aesthetics about :: and :, but I really feel > these symbols have a de-facto meaning that should have been respected and > that Haskell Prime would be a chance to correct this error. However no doubt > I'm alone in this view so fair enough
Not exactly alone; I've felt it was wrong ever since we argued about it for the first version of Haskell. ":" for typing is closer to common mathematical notation. But it's far too late to change it now. > - it's just syntax after all It is indeed. Jón -- Jón Fairbairn Jon.Fairbairn at cl.cam.ac.uk _______________________________________________ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe