Questions tagged [functional-programming]
For questions regarding functional programing concepts like immutability, closures, pure functions, and monads or regarding functional languages which enforce some or all of these constraints.
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How to implement + in a language where functions accept only one argument? [closed]
While reading about currying, I found the argument that it is beneficial in languages, which have only functions accepting only one argument.
I am wondering how to implement a 2-ary function like the ...
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Are there Haskell-like languages where equations allow for arbitrary left-hand sides?
In Haskell, you can define algorithms by equations that pattern-match on left-hand side constructors. For example:
...
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How does the map function work in stack-based languages?
In many languages, the map function takes a function and a list, and applies the function to each element of the list, returning a new list of the results. Some ...
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How do languages chain higher-order functions while still keeping performance?
How do different programming languages deal with the chaining of higher-order functions (ex. [1,2,3].foldl((a, b) => a+b, 0), ...
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10
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1
answer
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Towards a better default listlike datastructure for functional languages
In most functional languages I know of, linked lists are the default datastructure of choice for many operations. The benefits are clear - they're clearly encoded with ADTs, and can be utilised easily ...
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3
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1
answer
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How can I design a Functor trait to handle trait?
In programming languages like Rust, variables of different types that implement the same trait can have different sizes, i.e., the number of bytes used in the memory representation of the type. For ...
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1
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What is the object translating part of a monadic endofunctor? [closed]
A monad is an endofunctor $T:C\rightarrow C$ with natural transformations $\eta:id_C\rightarrow T$ and $\mu:T^2\rightarrow T$.
Being natural transformations mean that $$T(f)\circ \eta_A = \eta_B\circ ...
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3
votes
1
answer
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Call-by-value: Left-to-right vs right-to-left
There are three standard evaluation strategies for the lambda calculus:
Call-by-value (CBV)
Call-by-name
Call-by-need
There are two variants of CBV that differ on how they behave with respect to ...
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7
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1
answer
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Possible ways for a system interface in a lazy LC language?
I'm writing a backend for lazy lambda calculus. Now I'm curious about how it could interface with the system. As an experiment, I managed to write READ and WRITE primitives, each of which does the ...
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1
vote
1
answer
220
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How to avoid hidden performance problems in functional interfaces?
Swift has a protocol Sequence<Element>, which is used to support for-in loops. It has ...
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3
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1
answer
66
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Quantified variables without case-based analysis in traits
In almost every functional language I know of, quantified type variables are identified using case:
...
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10
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1
answer
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Why don't pure functional languages have object identity?
In object-oriented languages, there is typically a notion of object identity which is distinct from object value, such that two objects can have the same values but different identities. For example, ...
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10
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1
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What are the disadvantages of lazy languages?
I understand there are some advantages of lazy languages like Haskell. For example, one can easily write/use an infinite list without worrying about it being evaluated eagerly. I heard there are other ...
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1
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Which functions should a compiler cache outputs for?
Because a bare function object might not have constant time complexity, and because the function object might be called with the same argument repeatedly, I thought it might be good to cache its ...
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13
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3
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What are the pros and cons of automatically curried functions?
In several functional languages like Haskell and OCaml, functions are automatically curried. This means that a function taking two arguments (lambda x, y: x + y) is ...
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11
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2
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Capturing from outer stack to lambda in a stack-based language?
I'm working on a stack based lang that has "wraps", essentially lambdas, that by default run with an isolated stack (though some commands can push things to a wrap's stack, effectively ...
- 1,287
10
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Runtime/Backend for a lazy, pure functional, lambda-calculus-based language?
I'm thinking of writing a toy language based on lambda calculus. I want it to be lazily evaluated. I/O is not a concern for now; main will be a pure function that ...
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