What I Wish I Knew When Learning Haskell

Stephen Diehl
 2

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Contents

1 Basics 13
What is Haskell? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
How to Read . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
GHC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
ghcup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Package Managers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Project Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Cabal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Cabal New­Build . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Local Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Version Bounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Stack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Hpack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Base . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Prelude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Modern Haskell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Flags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Hackage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Stackage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
GHCi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
.ghci.conf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Editor Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Linux Packages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Type Signatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Currying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Algebraic Datatypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Pattern Matching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Guards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Operators and Sections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Tuples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Where & Let Clauses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Conditionals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Function Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
List Comprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Typeclasses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Side Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

3
CONTENTS 4

Records . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Pragmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Newtypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Bottoms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Exhaustiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Debugger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Stack Traces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Printf Tracing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Type Inference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Type Holes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Deferred Type Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Name Conventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
ghcid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
HLint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Docker Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Continuous Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Ormolu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Haddock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Unsafe Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

2 Monads 71
Eightfold Path to Monad Satori . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Monad Myths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Monad Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Monad Laws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Do Notation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Maybe Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
List Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
IO Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
What’s the point? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Reader Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Writer Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
State Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Why are monads confusing? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

3 Monad Transformers 87
mtl / transformers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Transformers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
mtl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
ReaderT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Newtype Deriving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Efficiency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Monad Morphisms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Effect Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Polysemy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Fused Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

4 Language Extensions 101

Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Extension Dependencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
The Benign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
The Advanced . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
The Lowlevel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
5 CONTENTS

The Dangerous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

NoMonomorphismRestriction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
ExtendedDefaultRules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Safe Haskell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
PartialTypeSignatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
RecursiveDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
ApplicativeDo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
PatternGuards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
ViewPatterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
TupleSections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Postfix Operators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
MultiWayIf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
EmptyCase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
LambdaCase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
NumDecimals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
PackageImports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
RecordWildCards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
NamedFieldPuns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
PatternSynonyms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
DeriveFunctor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
DeriveFoldable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
DeriveTraversable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
DeriveGeneric . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
DeriveAnyClass . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
DuplicateRecordFields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
OverloadedLabels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
CPP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
TypeApplications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
DerivingVia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
DerivingStrategies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Historical Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

5 Type Class Extensions 123

Standard Hierarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Instance Search . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Orphan Instances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Minimal Annotations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
TypeSynonymInstances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
FlexibleInstances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
FlexibleContexts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
OverlappingInstances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
IncoherentInstances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

6 Laziness 129
Strictness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Seq and WHNF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Thunks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
BangPatterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
StrictData . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Strict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Deepseq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Irrefutable Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
The Debate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

7 Prelude 137
CONTENTS 6

What to Avoid? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

What Should be in Prelude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Custom Preludes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Preludes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Protolude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Partial Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Replacing Partiality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Boolean Blindness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Foldable / Traversable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

8 Strings 147
String . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
String Conversions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
OverloadedStrings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Text.Builder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
ByteString . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Printf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Overloaded Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Regex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Escaping Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
String Splitting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

9 Applicatives 155
Alternative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Arrows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Bifunctors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
Polyvariadic Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160

10 Error Handling 161

Either Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
ExceptT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Control.Exception . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Exceptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Spoon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

11 Advanced Monads 167

Function Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
RWS Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Cont . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
MonadPlus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
MonadFail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
MonadFix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
ST Monad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Free Monads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
Indexed Monads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Lifted Base . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

12 Quantification 181
Universal Quantification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Free Theorems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Type Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Rank­N Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Existential Quantification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Impredicative Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
7 CONTENTS

Scoped Type Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

13 GADTs 189
Kind Signatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Void . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Phantom Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Typelevel Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

14 Interpreters 195
HOAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
PHOAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Final Interpreters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Finally Tagless . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Datatypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
F­Algebras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Recursion Schemes & The Morphism Zoo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
Hint and Mueval . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

15 Testing 209
QuickCheck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
SmallCheck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
QuickSpec . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
Tasty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Silently . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

16 Type Families 217

MultiParam Typeclasses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
Type Families . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
Injectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
Roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
NonEmpty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Manual Proofs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Constraint Kinds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
TypeFamilyDependencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

17 Promotion 229
Higher Kinded Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Kind Polymorphism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Data Kinds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Size­Indexed Vectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Typelevel Numbers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Typelevel Strings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Custom Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Type Equality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Proxies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Promoted Syntax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Singleton Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Closed Type Families . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
Kind Indexed Type Families . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
HLists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Typelevel Dictionaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Advanced Proofs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Liquid Haskell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252

18 Generics 255
CONTENTS 8

Generic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
Generic Deriving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
Typeable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Dynamic Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Uniplate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

19 Mathematics 269
Numeric Tower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
GMP Integers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
Complex Numbers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
Decimal & Scientific Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
Polynomial Arithmetic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Combinatorics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Number Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Stochastic Calculus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Differential Equations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Statistics & Probability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
Constructive Reals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
SAT Solvers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
SMT Solvers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

20 Data Structures 279

Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Vector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Mutable Vectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Unordered Containers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
Hashtables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Graphs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Graph Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
DList . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
Sequence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287

21 FFI 289
Pure Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
Storable Arrays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
Function Pointers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
hsc2hs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292

22 Concurrency 295
Sparks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
Threads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
IORef . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
MVars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
TVar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
Chans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
Semaphores . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Threadscope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
Strategies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
STM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
Monad Par . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
Async . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
9 CONTENTS

23 Parsing 311
Parsec . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
Custom Lexer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
Simple Parsing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
Megaparsec . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
Attoparsec . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318
Configurator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Optparse Applicative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
Happy & Alex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 324

24 Streaming 329
Lazy IO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
Pipes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
ZeroMQ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331
Conduits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333

25 Cryptography 335
SHA Hashing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
Password Hashing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
Curve25519 Diffie­Hellman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
Ed25519 EdDSA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
Merkle Trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
Secure Memory Handling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
AES Encryption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
Galois Fields . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
Elliptic Curves . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Pairing Cryptography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
zkSNARKs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344

26 Dates and Times 345

time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
ISO8601 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346

27 Data Formats 349

JSON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
Yaml . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
CSV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

28 Network & Web Programming 359

Frameworks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359
HTTP Requests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360
Req . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
Blaze . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362
Lucid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
Hastache . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364
Warp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365
Scotty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 366
Servant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 366

29 Databases 371
Postgres . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371
Sqlite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 375
Redis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376
Acid State . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
Selda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 378
CONTENTS 10

30 GHC 381
Compiler Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381
GHC API . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382
DynFlags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383
Package Databases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 384
HIE Bios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
Abstract Syntax Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 386
Parser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
Outputable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 388
Datatypes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 390
Inliner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
Primops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
SIMD Intrinsics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
Rewrite Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
Boot Libraries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397
Dictionaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 398
Specialization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399
Static Compilation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
Unboxed Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
IO/ST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 404
ghc­heap­view . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 406
STG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 408
Worker/Wrapper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 410
Z­Encoding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 410
Cmm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 411
Inline CMM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 417
Optimisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418
Interface Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 419
Runtime System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420

31 Profiling 427
Criterion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427
EKG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429
RTS Profiling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429

32 Compilers 431
Unbound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431
Unbound Generics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 434
Pretty Printers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 436
prettyprinter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 436
pretty­simple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
Haskeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
Repline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 440
LLVM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 442

33 Template Haskell 445

Metaprogramming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 445
Quasiquotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 445
language­c­quote . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448
GPU Kernels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449
Template Haskell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 450
Antiquotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 454
Templated Type Families . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457
Templated Type Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
11 CONTENTS

Multiline Strings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461

Path Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462

34 Categories 463
Do I need to Learn Category Theory? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 463
Abstract Algebra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 463
Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468
Isomorphisms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
Duality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
Functors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
Natural Transformations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
Kleisli Category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 472
Monoidal Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
Further Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474

35 Source Code 475

CONTENTS 12
Chapter 1

Basics

What is Haskell?
At its heart Haskell is a lazy, functional, statically­typed programming language with advanced type system features
such as higher­rank, higher­kinded parametric polymorphism, monadic effects, generalized algebraic data types, ad­hoc
polymorphism through type classes, associated type families, and more. As a programming language, Haskell pushes
the frontiers of programming language design more so than any other general purpose language while still remaining
practical for everyday use.
Beyond language features, Haskell remains an organic, community­driven effort, run by its userbase instead of by cor­
porate influences. While there are some Haskell companies and consultancies, most are fairly small and none have an
outsized influence on the development of the language. This is in stark contrast to ecosystems like Java and Go where
Oracle and Google dominate all development. In fact, the Haskell community is a synthesis between multiple disci­
plines of academic computer science and industrial users from large and small firms, all of whom contribute back to the
language ecosystem.
Originally, Haskell was borne out of academic research. Designed as an ML dialect, it was initially inspired by an older
language called Miranda. In the early 90s, a group of academics formed the GHC committee to pursue building a
research vehicle for lazy programming languages as a replacement for Miranda. This was a particularly in­vogue research
topic at the time and as a result the committee attracted various talented individuals who initiated the language and
ultimately laid the foundation for modern Haskell.
Over the last 30 years Haskell has evolved into a mature ecosystem, with an equally mature compiler. Even so, the
language is frequently reimagined by passionate contributors who may be furthering academic research goals or merely
contributing out of personal interest. Although laziness was originally the major research goal, this has largely become
a quirky artifact that most users of the language are generally uninterested in. In modern times the major themes of
Haskell community are:
• A vehicle for type system research
• Experimentation in the design space of typed effect systems
• Algebraic structures as a method of program synthesis
• Referential transparency as a core language feature
• Embedded domain specific languages
• Experimentation toward practical dependent types
• Stronger encoding of invariants through type­level programming
• Efficient functional compiler design
• Alternative models of parallel and concurrent programming
Although these are the major research goals, Haskell is still a fully general purpose language, and it has been applied in
wildly diverse settings from garbage trucks to cryptanalysis for the defense sector and everything in­between. With a
thriving ecosystem of industrial applications in web development, compiler design, machine learning, financial services,

13
BASICS 14

FPGA development, algorithmic trading, numerical computing, cryptography research, and cybersecurity, the language
has a lot to offer to any field or software practitioner.
Haskell as an ecosystem is one that is purely organic, it takes decades to evolve, makes mistakes and is not driven by any
one ideology or belief about the purpose of functional programming. This makes Haskell programming simultaneously
frustrating and exciting; and therein lies the fun that has been the intellectual siren song that has drawn many talented
programmers to dabble in this beautiful language at some point in their lives.
See:
• A History of Haskell
• Wearing the Hair Shirt: A Retrospective on Haskell

How to Read
This is a guide for working software engineers who have an interest in Haskell but don’t know Haskell yet. I presume
you know some basics about how your operating system works, the shell, and some fundamentals of other imperative
programming languages. If you are a Python or Java software engineer with no Haskell experience, this is the executive
summary of Haskell theory and practice for you. We’ll delve into a little theory as needed to explain concepts but no more
than necessary. If you’re looking for a purely introductory tutorial, this probably isn’t the right start for you, however this
can be read as a companion to other introductory texts.
There is no particular order to this guide, other than the first chapter which describes how to get set up with Haskell and
use the foundational compiler and editor tooling. After that you are free to browse the chapters in any order. Most are
divided into several sections which outline different concepts, language features or libraries. However, the general arc of
this guide bends toward more complex topics in later chapters.
As there is no ordering after the first chapter I will refer to concepts globally without introducing them first. If something
doesn’t make sense just skip it and move on. I strongly encourage you to play around with the source code modules for
yourself. Haskell cannot be learned from an armchair; instead it can only be mastered by writing a ton of code for
yourself. GHC may initially seem like a cruel instructor, but in time most people grow to see it as their friend.

GHC
GHC is the Glorious Glasgow Haskell Compiler. Originally written in 1989, GHC is now the de facto standard for
Haskell compilers. A few other compilers have existed along the way, but they either are quite limited or have bit
rotted over the years. At this point, GHC is a massive compiler and it supports a wide variety of extensions. It’s also
the only reference implementation for the Haskell language and as such, it defines what Haskell the language is by its
implementation.
GHC is run at the command line with the command ghc .

$ ghc --version
The Glorious Glasgow Haskell Compilation System, version 8.8.1

$ ghc Example.hs -o example

$ ghc --make Example.hs

GHC’s runtime is written in C and uses machinery from GCC infrastructure for its native code generator and can also
use LLVM for its native code generation. GHC is supported on the following architectures:
• Linux x86
• Linux x86_64
• Linux PowerPC
15 BASICS

• NetBSD x86
• OpenBSD x86
• FreeBSD x86
• MacOS X Intel
• MacOS X PowerPC
• Windows x86_64

GHC itself depends on the following Linux packages.

• build­essential
• libgmp­dev
• libffi­dev
• libncurses­dev
• libtinfo5

ghcup
There are two major packages that need to be installed to use Haskell:

• ghc
• cabal­install

GHC can be installed on Linux and Mac with ghcup by running the following command:

$ curl https://get-ghcup.haskell.org -sSf | sh

This can be used to manage multiple versions of GHC installed locally.

$ ghcup install 8.6.5

$ ghcup install 8.4.4

To select which version of GHC is available on the PATH use the set command.

$ ghcup set 8.8.1

This can also be used to install cabal.

$ ghcup install-cabal

To modify your shell to include ghc and cabal.

$ source ~/.ghcup/env

Or you can permanently add the following to your .bashrc or .zshrc file:

export PATH="~/.ghcup/bin:$PATH"
BASICS 16

Package Managers
There are two major Haskell packaging tools: Cabal and Stack. Both take differing views on versioning schemes but can
more or less interoperate at the package level. So, why are there two different package managers?

The simplest explanation is that Haskell is an organic ecosystem with no central authority, and as such different groups
of people with different ideas and different economic interests about optimal packaging built their own solutions around
two different models. The interests of an organic community don’t always result in open source convergence; however,
the ecosystem has seen both package managers reach much greater levels of stability as a result of collaboration. In this
article, I won’t offer a preference for which system to use: it is left up to the reader to experiment and use the system
which best suits your or your company’s needs.

Project Structure
A typical Haskell project hosted on Github or Gitlab will have several executable, test and library components across
several subdirectories. Each of these files will correspond to an entry in the Cabal file.

.
├── app # Executable entry-point
│   └── Main.hs # main-is file
├── src # Library entry-point
│   └── Lib.hs # Exposed module
├── test # Test entry-point
│   └── Spec.hs # Main-is file
├── ChangeLog.md # extra-source-files
├── LICENSE # extra-source-files
├── README.md # extra-source-files
├── package.yaml # hpack configuration
├── Setup.hs
├── simple.cabal # cabal configuration generated from hpack
├── stack.yaml # stack configuration
├── .hlint.yaml # hlint configuration
└── .ghci # ghci configuration

More complex projects consisting of multiple modules will include multiple project directories like those above, but these
will be nested in subfolders with a cabal.project or stack.yaml in the root of the repository.

.
├── lib-one # component1
├── lib-two # component2
├── lib-three # component3
├── stack.yaml # stack project configuration
└── cabal.project # cabal project configuration

An example Cabal project file, named cabal.project above, this multi­component library repository would include
these lines.

packages: ./lib-one
./lib-two
./lib-three

By contrast, an example Stack project stack.yaml for the above multi­component library repository would be:
17 BASICS

resolver: lts-14.20
packages:
- 'lib-one'
- 'lib-two'
- 'lib-three'

extra-package-dbs: []

Cabal
Cabal is the build system for Haskell. Cabal is also the standard build tool for Haskell source supported by GHC. Cabal
can be used simultaneously with Stack or standalone with cabal new­build.
To update the package index from Hackage, run:

$ cabal update

To start a new Haskell project, run:

$ cabal init
$ cabal configure

This will result in a .cabal file being created with the configuration options for our new project.
Cabal can also build dependencies in parallel by passing -j<n> where n is the number of concurrent builds.

$ cabal install -j4 --only-dependencies

Let’s look at an example .cabal file. There are two main entry points that any package may provide: a library
and an executable . Multiple executables can be defined, but only one library. In addition, there is a special form of
executable entry point Test-Suite , which defines an interface for invoking unit tests from cabal .
For a library, the exposed-modules field in the .cabal file indicates which modules within the package structure
will be publicly visible when the package is installed. These modules are the user­facing APIs that we wish to expose to
downstream consumers.
For an executable, the main-is field indicates the module that exports the main function responsible for running
the executable logic of the application. Every module in the package must be listed in one of other-modules ,
exposed-modules or main-is fields.

name: mylibrary
version: 0.1
cabal-version: >= 1.10
author: Paul Atreides
license: MIT
license-file: LICENSE
synopsis: My example library.
category: Math
tested-with: GHC
build-type: Simple
BASICS 18

library
exposed-modules:
Library.ExampleModule1
Library.ExampleModule2

build-depends:
base >= 4 && < 5

default-language: Haskell2010

ghc-options: -O2 -Wall -fwarn-tabs

executable "example"
build-depends:
base >= 4 && < 5,
mylibrary == 0.1
default-language: Haskell2010
main-is: Main.hs

Test-Suite test
type: exitcode-stdio-1.0
main-is: Test.hs
default-language: Haskell2010
build-depends:
base >= 4 && < 5,
mylibrary == 0.1

To run an “executable” under cabal execute the command:

$ cabal run
$ cabal run <name> # when there are several executables in a project

To load the “library” into a GHCi shell under cabal execute the command:

$ cabal repl
$ cabal repl <name>

The <name> metavariable is either one of the executable or library declarations in the .cabal file and can optionally
be disambiguated by the prefix exe:<name> or lib:<name> respectively.
To build the package locally into the ./dist/build folder, execute the build command:

$ cabal build

To run the tests, our package must itself be reconfigured with the --enable-tests flag and the build-depends
options. The Test-Suite must be installed manually, if not already present.

$ cabal install --only-dependencies --enable-tests

$ cabal configure --enable-tests
$ cabal test
19 BASICS

$ cabal test <name>

Moreover, arbitrary shell commands can be invoked with the GHC environmental variables. It is quite common is to
run a new bash shell with this command such that the ghc and ghci commands use the package environment. This
can also run any system executable with the GHC_PACKAGE_PATH variable set to the libraries package database.

$ cabal exec
$ cabal exec bash

The haddock documentation can be generated for the local project by executing the haddock command. The docu­
mentation will be built to the ./dist folder.

$ cabal haddock

When we’re finally ready to upload to Hackage ( presuming we have a Hackage account set up ), then we can build the
tarball and upload with the following commands:

$ cabal sdist
$ cabal upload dist/mylibrary-0.1.tar.gz

The current state of a local build can be frozen with all current package constraints enumerated:

$ cabal freeze

This will create a file cabal.config with the constraint set.

constraints: mtl ==2.2.1,

text ==1.1.1.3,
transformers ==0.4.1.0

The cabal configuration is stored in $HOME/.cabal/config and contains various options including credential infor­
mation for Hackage upload.
A library can also be compiled with runtime profiling information enabled. More on this is discussed in the section on
Concurrency and Profiling.

library-profiling: True

Another common flag to enable is documentation which forces the local build of Haddock documentation, which can
be useful for offline reference. On a Linux filesystem these are built to the /usr/share/doc/ghc-doc/html/libraries/
directory.

documentation: True

Cabal can also be used to install packages globally to the system PATH. For example the parsec package to your system
from Hackage, the upstream source of Haskell packages, invoke the install command:

$ cabal install parsec --installdir=~/.local/bin # latest version

BASICS 20

To download the source for a package, we can use the get command to retrieve the source from Hackage.

$ cabal get parsec # fetch source

$ cd parsec-3.1.5

$ cabal configure
$ cabal build
$ cabal install

Cabal New­Build
The interface for Cabal has seen an overhaul in the last few years and has moved more closely towards the Nix­style of
local builds. Under the new system packages are separated into categories:
• Local Packages ­ Packages are built from a configuration file which specifies a path to a directory with a cabal file.
These can be working projects as well as all of its local transitive dependencies.
• External Packages ­ External packages are packages retrieved from either the public Hackage or a private Hackage
repository. These packages are hashed and stored locally in ~/.cabal/store to be reused across builds.

As of Cabal 3.0 the new­build commands are the default operations for build operations. So if you type cabal build
using Cabal 3.0 you are already using the new­build system.
Historically these commands were separated into two different command namespaces with prefixes v1- and v2- , with
v1 indicating the old sandbox build system and the v2 indicating the new­build system.
The new build commands are listed below:

new-build Compile targets within the project.

new-configure Add extra project configuration
new-repl Open an interactive session for the given component.
new-run Run an executable.
new-test Run test-suites
new-bench Run benchmarks
new-freeze Freeze dependencies.
new-haddock Build Haddock documentation
new-exec Give a command access to the store.
new-update Updates list of known packages.
new-install Install packages.
new-clean Clean the package store and remove temporary files.
new-sdist Generate a source distribution file (.tar.gz).

Cabal also stores all of its build artifacts inside of a dist-newstyle folder stored in the project working directory. The
compilation artifacts are of several categories.
• .hi ­ Haskell interface modules which describe the type information, public exports, symbol table, and other
module guts of compiled Haskell modules.
• .hie ­ An extended interface file containing module symbol data.
• .hspp ­ A Haskell preprocessor file.
• .o ­ Compiled object files for each module. These are emitted by the native code generator assembler.
• .s ­ Assembly language source file.
• .bc ­ Compiled LLVM bytecode file.
• .ll ­ An LLVM source file.
• cabal_macros.h ­ Contains all of the preprocessor definitions that are accessible when using the CPP extension.
21 BASICS

• cache ­ Contains all artifacts generated by solving the constraints of packages to set up a build plan. This also
contains the hash repository of all external packages.
• packagedb ­ Database of all of the cabal metadata of all external and local packages needed to build the project.
See Package Databases.

These all get stored under the dist-newstyle folder structure which is set up hierarchically under the specific CPU
architecture, GHC compiler version and finally the package version.

dist-newstyle
├── build
│   └── x86_64-linux
│   └── ghc-8.6.5
│   └── mypackage-0.1.0
│   ├── build
│   │   ├── autogen
│   │   │   ├── cabal_macros.h
│   │   │   └── Paths_mypackage.hs
│   │   ├── libHSmypackage-0.1.0-inplace.a
│   │   ├── libHSmypackage-0.1.0-inplace-ghc8.6.5.so
│   │   ├── MyPackage
│   │   │   ├── Example.dyn_hi
│   │   │   ├── Example.dyn_o
│   │   │   ├── Example.hi
│   │   │   ├── Example.o
│   │   ├── MyPackage.dyn_hi
│   │   ├── MyPackage.dyn_o
│   │   ├── MyPackage.hi
│   │   └── MyPackage.o
│   ├── cache
│   │   ├── build
│   │   ├── config
│   │   └── registration
│   ├── package.conf.inplace
│   │   ├── package.cache
│   │   └── package.cache.lock
│   └── setup-config
├── cache
│   ├── compiler
│   ├── config
│   ├── elaborated-plan
│   ├── improved-plan
│   ├── plan.json
│   ├── solver-plan
│   ├── source-hashes
│   └── up-to-date
├── packagedb
│   └── ghc-8.6.5
│   ├── package.cache
│   ├── package.cache.lock
│   └── mypackage-0.1.0-inplace.conf
└── tmp
BASICS 22

Local Packages
Both Stack and Cabal can handle local packages built from the local filesystem, from remote tarballs, or from remote Git
repositories.
Inside of the stack.yaml simply specify the git repository remote and the hash to pull.

resolver: lts-14.20
packages:
# From Git
- git: https://github.com/sdiehl/protolude.git
commit: f5c2bf64b147716472b039d30652846069f2fc70

In Cabal to add a remote create a cabal.project file and add your remote in the source-repository-package
section.

packages: .

source-repository-package
type: git
location: https://github.com/hvr/HsYAML.git
tag: e70cf0c171c9a586b62b3f75d72f1591e4e6aaa1

Version Bounds
All Haskell packages are versioned and the numerical quantities in the version are supposed to follow the Package Ver­
sioning Policy.
As packages evolve over time there are three numbers which monotonically increase depending on what has changed in
the package.
• Major version number
• Minor version number
• Patch version number

-- PVP summary: +-+------- breaking API changes

-- | | +----- non-breaking API additions
-- | | | +--- code changes with no API change
version: 0.1.0.0

Every library’s cabal file will have a packages dependencies section which will specify the external packages which the
library depends on. It will also contain the allowed versions that it is known to build against in the build-depends
section. The convention is to put the upper bound to the next major unreleased version and the lower bound at the
currently used version.

build-depends:
base >= 4.6 && <4.14,
async >= 2.0 && <2.3,
deepseq >= 1.3 && <1.5,
containers >= 0.5 && <0.7,
hashable >= 1.2 && <1.4,
transformers >= 0.2 && <0.6,
23 BASICS

text >= 1.2 && <1.3,

bytestring >= 0.10 && <0.11,
mtl >= 2.1 && <2.3

Individual lines in the version specification can be dependent on other variables in the cabal file.

if !impl(ghc >= 8.0)

Build-Depends: fail >= 4.9 && <4.10

Version bounds in cabal files can be managed automatically with a tool cabal-bounds which can automatically gener­
ate, update and format cabal files.

$ cabal-bounds update

See:
• Package Versioning Policy

Stack
Stack is an alternative approach to Haskell’s package structure that emerged in 2015. Instead of using a rolling build like
Cabal, Stack breaks up sets of packages into release blocks that guarantee internal compatibility between sets of packages.
The package solver for Stack uses a different strategy for resolving dependencies than cabal­install has historically used
and Stack combines this with a centralised build server called Stackage which continuously tests the set of packages in a
resolver to ensure they build against each other.

Install
To install stack on Linux or Mac, run:

curl -sSL https://get.haskellstack.org/ | sh

For other operating systems, see the official install directions.

Usage
Once stack is installed, it is possible to setup a build environment on top of your existing project’s cabal file by
running:

stack init

An example stack.yaml file for GHC 8.8.1 would look like this:

resolver: lts-14.20
flags: {}
extra-package-dbs: []
packages: []
extra-deps: []
BASICS 24

Most of the common libraries used in everyday development are already in the Stackage repository. The extra-deps
field can be used to add Hackage dependencies that are not in the Stackage repository. They are specified by the package
and the version key. For instance, the zenc package could be added to stack build in the following way:

extra-deps:
- zenc-0.1.1

The stack command can be used to install packages and executables into either the current build environment or the
global environment. For example, the following command installs the executable for hlint , a popular linting tool for
Haskell, and places it in the PATH:

$ stack install hlint

To check the set of dependencies, run:

$ stack list-dependencies

Just as with cabal , the build and debug process can be orchestrated using stack commands:

$ stack build # Build a cabal target

$ stack repl # Launch ghci
$ stack ghc # Invoke the standalone compiler in stack environment
$ stack exec bash # Execute a shell command with the stack GHC environment variables
$ stack build --file-watch # Build on every filesystem change

To visualize the dependency graph, use the dot command piped first into graphviz, then piped again into your favorite
image viewer:

$ stack dot --external | dot -Tpng | feh -

Hpack
Hpack is an alternative package description language that uses a structured YAML format to generate Cabal files. Hpack
succeeds in DRYing (Don’t Repeat Yourself ) several sections of cabal files that are often quite repetitive across large
projects. Hpack uses a package.yaml file which is consumed by the command line tool hpack . Hpack can be
integrated into Stack and will generate resulting cabal files whenever stack build is invoked on a project using a
package.yaml file. The output cabal file contains a hash of the input yaml file for consistency checking.

A small package.yaml file might look something like the following:

name : example
version : 0.1.0
synopsis : My fabulous library
description : My fabulous library
maintainer : John Doe
github : john/example
category : Development

ghc-options: -Wall
25 BASICS

dependencies:
- base >= 4.9 && < 5
- protolude
- deepseq
- directory
- filepath
- text
- containers
- unordered-containers
- aeson
- pretty-simple

library:
source-dirs: src
exposed-modules:
- Example

executable:
main: Main.hs
source-dirs: exe
dependencies:
- example

tests:
spec:
main: Test.hs
source-dirs:
- test
- src
dependencies:
- example
- tasty
- tasty-hunit

Base
GHC itself ships with a variety of core libraries that are loaded into all Haskell projects. The most foundational of these
is base which forms the foundation for all Haskell code. The base library is split across several modules.
• Prelude ­ The default namespace imported in every module.
• Data ­ The simple data structures wired into the language
• Control ­ Control flow functions
• Foreign ­ Foreign function interface
• Numeric ­ Numerical tower and arithmetic operations
• System ­ System operations for Linux/Mac/Windows
• Text ­ Basic String types.
• Type ­ Typelevel operations
• GHC ­ GHC Internals
• Debug ­ Debug functions
• Unsafe ­ Unsafe “backdoor” operations
There have been several large changes to Base over the years which have resulted in breaking changes that means older
BASICS 26

versions of base are not compatible with newer versions.

• Monad Applicative Proposal (AMP)
• MonadFail Proposal (MFP)
• Semigroup Monoid Proposal (SMP)

Prelude
The Prelude is the default standard module. The Prelude is imported by default into all Haskell modules unless either
there is an explicit import statement for it, or the NoImplicitPrelude extension is enabled.
The Prelude exports several hundred symbols that are the default datatypes and functions for libraries that use the GHC­
issued prelude. Although the Prelude is the default import, many libraries these days do not use the standard prelude
instead choosing to roll a custom one on a per­project basis or to use an off­the shelf prelude from Hackage.
The Prelude contains common datatype and classes such as List, Monad, Maybe and most associated functions for
manipulating these structures. These are the most foundational programming constructs in Haskell.

Modern Haskell
There are two official language standards:
• Haskell98
• Haskell2010
And then there is what is colloquially referred to as Modern Haskell which is not an official language standard, but
an ambiguous term to denote the emerging way most Haskellers program with new versions of GHC. The language
features typically included in modern Haskell are not well­defined and will vary between programmers. For instance,
some programmers prefer to stay quite close to the Haskell2010 standard and only include a few extensions while some
go all out and attempt to do full dependent types in Haskell.
By contrast, the type of programming described by the phrase Modern Haskell typically utilizes some type­level pro­
gramming, as well as flexible typeclasses, and a handful of Language Extensions.

Flags
GHC has a wide variety of flags that can be passed to configure different behavior in the compiler. Enabling GHC
compiler flags grants the user more control in detecting common code errors. The most frequently used flags are:

Flag Description
-fwarn-tabs Emit warnings of tabs instead of spaces in the source code
-fwarn-unused-imports Warn about libraries imported without being used
-fwarn-name-shadowing Warn on duplicate names in nested bindings
-fwarn-incomplete-uni-patterns Emit warnings for incomplete patterns in lambdas or pattern bindings
-fwarn-incomplete-patterns Warn on non­exhaustive patterns
-fwarn-overlapping-patterns Warn on pattern matching branches that overlap
-fwarn-incomplete-record-updates Warn when records are not instantiated with all fields
-fdefer-type-errors Turn type errors into warnings
-fwarn-missing-signatures Warn about toplevel missing type signatures
-fwarn-monomorphism-restriction Warn when the monomorphism restriction is applied implicitly
-fwarn-orphans Warn on orphan typeclass instances
-fforce-recomp Force recompilation regardless of timestamp
-fno-code Omit code generation, just parse and typecheck
27 BASICS

Flag Description
-fobject-code Generate object code

Like most compilers, GHC takes the -Wall flag to enable all warnings. However, a few of the enabled warnings are
highly verbose. For example, -fwarn-unused-do-bind and -fwarn-unused-matches typically would not corre­
spond to errors or failures.
Any of these flags can be added to the ghc-options section of a project’s .cabal file. For example:

ghc-options:
-fwarn-tabs
-fwarn-unused-imports
-fwarn-missing-signatures
-fwarn-name-shadowing
-fwarn-incomplete-patterns

The flags described above are simply the most useful. See the official reference for the complete set of GHC’s supported
flags.
For information on debugging GHC internals, see the commentary on GHC internals.

Hackage
Hackage is the upstream source of open source Haskell packages. With Haskell’s continuing evolution, Hackage has
become many things to developers, but there seem to be two dominant philosophies of uploaded libraries.
A Repository for Production Libraries
In the first philosophy, libraries exist as reliable, community­supported building blocks for constructing higher level
functionality on top of a common, stable edifice. In development communities where this method is the dominant
philosophy, the authors of libraries have written them as a means of packaging up their understanding of a problem
domain so that others can build on their understanding and expertise.
An Experimental Playground
In contrast to the previous method of packaging, a common philosophy in the Haskell community is that Hackage
is a place to upload experimental libraries as a means of getting community feedback and making the code publicly
available. Library authors often rationalize putting these kinds of libraries up without documentation, often without
indication of what the library actually does or how it works. This unfortunately means a lot of Hackage namespace has
become polluted with dead­end, bit­rotting code. Sometimes packages are also uploaded purely for internal use within
an organisation, or to accompany an academic paper. These packages are often left undocumented as well.
For developers coming to Haskell from other language ecosystems that favor the former philosophy (e.g., Python,
JavaScript, Ruby), seeing thousands of libraries without the slightest hint of documentation or description of purpose can
be unnerving. It is an open question whether the current cultural state of Hackage is sustainable in light of these philo­
sophical differences.
Needless to say, there is a lot of very low­quality Haskell code and documentation out there today, so being conservative
in library assessment is a necessary skill. That said, there are also quite a few phenomenal libraries on Hackage that are
highly curated by many people.
As a general rule, if the Haddock documentation for the library does not have a minimal working example, it is usually
safe to assume that it is an RFC­style library and probably should be avoided for production code.
There are several heuristics you can use to answer the question Should I Use this Hackage Library:
• Check the Uploaded to see if the author has updated it in the last five years.
BASICS 28

• Check the Maintainer email address, if the author has an academic email address and has not uploaded a package
in two or more years, it is safe to assume that this is a thesis project and probably should not be used industrially.
• Check the Modules to see if the author has included toplevel Haddock docstrings. If the author has not included
any documentation then the library is likely of low­quality and should not be used industrially.
• Check the Dependencies for the bound on base package. If it doesn’t include the latest base included with the
latest version of GHC then the code is likely not actively maintained.
• Check the reverse Hackage search to see if the package is used by other libraries in the ecosystem. For example:
https://packdeps.haskellers.com/reverse/QuickCheck
An example of a bitrotted package:
https://hackage.haskell.org/package/numeric­quest
An example of a well maintained package:
https://hackage.haskell.org/package/QuickCheck

Stackage
Stackage is an alternative opt­in packaging repository which mirrors a subset of Hackage. Packages that are included
in Stackage are built in a massive continuous integration process that checks to see that given versions link successfully
against each other. This can give a higher degree of assurance that the bounds of a given resolver ensure compatibility.
Stackage releases are built nightly and there are also long­term stable (LTS) releases. Nightly resolvers have a date con­
vention while LTS releases have a major and minor version. For example:
• lts-14.22
• nightly-2020-01-30
See:
• Stackage
• Stackage FAQ

GHCi
GHCi is the interactive shell for the GHC compiler. GHCi is where we will spend most of our time in everyday
development. Following is a table of useful GHCi commands.

Command Shortcut Action

:reload :r Code reload
:type :t Type inspection
:kind :k Kind inspection
:info :i Information
:print :p Print the expression
:edit :e Load file in system editor
:load :l Set the active Main module in the REPL
:module :m Add modules to imports
:add :ad Load a file into the REPL namespace
:instances :in Show instances of a typeclass
:browse :bro Browse all available symbols in the REPL namespace

The introspection commands are an essential part of debugging and interacting with Haskell code:
29 BASICS

λ: :type 3
3 :: Num a => a

λ: :kind Either
Either :: * -> * -> *

λ: :info Functor
class Functor f where
fmap :: (a -> b) -> f a -> f b
(<$) :: a -> f b -> f a
-- Defined in `GHC.Base'
...

λ: :i (:)
data [] a = ... | a : [a] -- Defined in `GHC.Types'
infixr 5 :

Querying the current state of the global environment in the shell is also possible. For example, to view module­level
bindings and types in GHCi, run:

λ: :browse
λ: :show bindings

To examine module­level imports, execute:

λ: :show imports
import Prelude -- implicit
import Data.Eq
import Control.Monad

Language extensions can be set at the repl.

:set -XNoImplicitPrelude
:set -XFlexibleContexts
:set -XFlexibleInstances
:set -XOverloadedStrings

To see compiler­level flags and pragmas, use:

λ: :set
options currently set: none.
base language is: Haskell2010
with the following modifiers:
-XNoDatatypeContexts
-XNondecreasingIndentation
GHCi-specific dynamic flag settings:
BASICS 30

other dynamic, non-language, flag settings:

-fimplicit-import-qualified
warning settings:

λ: :showi language
base language is: Haskell2010
with the following modifiers:
-XNoDatatypeContexts
-XNondecreasingIndentation
-XExtendedDefaultRules

Language extensions and compiler pragmas can be set at the prompt. See the Flag Reference for the vast collection of
compiler flag options.
Several commands for the interactive shell have shortcuts:

Function
+t Show types of evaluated expressions
+s Show timing and memory usage
+m Enable multi­line expression delimited by :{ and :} .

λ: :set +t
λ: []
[]
it :: [a]

λ: :set +s
λ: foldr (+) 0 [1..25]
325
it :: Prelude.Integer
(0.02 secs, 4900952 bytes)

λ: :{
λ:| let foo = do
λ:| putStrLn "hello ghci"
λ:| :}
λ: foo
"hello ghci"

.ghci.conf
The GHCi shell can be customized globally by defining a configure file ghci.conf in $HOME/.ghc/ or in the current
working directory as ./.ghci.conf .

For example, we can add a command to use the Hoogle type search from within GHCi. First, install hoogle :
31 BASICS

# run one of these command

$ cabal install hoogle
$ stack install hoogle

Then, we can enable the search functionality by adding a command to our ghci.conf :

:set prompt "λ: "

:def hlint const . return $ ":! hlint \"src\""

:def hoogle \s -> return $ ":! hoogle --count=15 \"" ++ s ++ "\""

λ: :hoogle (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

Data.Traversable fmapDefault :: Traversable t => (a -> b) -> t a -> t b
Prelude fmap :: Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

It is common community tradition to set the prompt to a colored λ :

:set prompt "\ESC[38;5;208m\STXλ>\ESC[m\STX "

GHC can also be coerced into giving slightly better error messages:

-- Better errors
:set -ferror-spans -freverse-errors -fprint-expanded-synonyms

GHCi can also use a pretty printing library to format all output, which is often much easier to read. For example if your
project is already using the amazing pretty-simple library simply include the following line in your ghci configuration.

:set -ignore-package pretty-simple -package pretty-simple

:def! pretty \ _ -> pure ":set -interactive-print Text.Pretty.Simple.pPrint"
:pretty

And the default prelude can also be disabled and swapped for something more sensible:

:seti -XNoImplicitPrelude
:seti -XFlexibleContexts
:seti -XFlexibleInstances
:seti -XOverloadedStrings
import Protolude -- or any other preferred prelude

GHCi Performance
For large projects, GHCi with the default flags can use quite a bit of memory and take a long time to compile. To
speed compilation by keeping artifacts for compiled modules around, we can enable object code compilation instead of
bytecode.

:set -fobject-code
BASICS 32

Enabling object code compilation may complicate type inference, since type information provided to the shell can some­
times be less informative than source­loaded code. This underspecificity can result in breakage with some language ex­
tensions. In that case, you can temporarily reenable bytecode compilation on a per module basis with the -fbyte-code
flag.

:set -fbyte-code
:load MyModule.hs

If you all you need is to typecheck your code in the interactive shell, then disabling code generation entirely makes
reloading code almost instantaneous:

:set -fno-code

Editor Integration
Haskell has a variety of editor tools that can be used to provide interactive development feedback and functionality such
as querying types of subexpressions, linting, type checking, and code completion. These are largely provided by the
haskell­ide­engine which serves as an editor agnostic backend that interfaces with GHC and Cabal to query code.

Vim

• haskell­ide­engine
• haskell­vim
• vim­ormolu

Emacs

• haskell­mode
• haskell­ide­engine
• ormolu.el

VSCode

• haskell­ide­engine
• language­haskell
• ghcid
• hie­server
• hlint
• ghcide
• ormolu­vscode

Linux Packages
There are several upstream packages for Linux packages which are released by GHC development. The key ones of note
for Linux are:

• Debian Packages
• Debian PPA

For scripts and operations tools, it is common to include commands to add the following apt repositories, and then use
these to install the signed GHC and cabal­install binaries (if using Cabal as the primary build system).
33 BASICS

$ sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:hvr/ghc

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get install -y cabal-install-3.0 ghc-8.8.1

It is not advisable to use a Linux system package manager to manage Haskell dependencies. Although this can be done,
in practice it is better to use Cabal or Stack to create locally isolated builds to avoid incompatibilities.

Names
Names in Haskell exist within a specific namespace. Names are either unqualified of the form:

nub

Or qualified by the module where they come from, such as:

Data.List.nub

The major namespaces are described below with their naming conventions

Namespace Convention
Modules Uppercase
Functions Lowercase
Variables Lowercase
Type Variables Lowercase
Datatypes Uppercase
Constructors Uppercase
Typeclasses Uppercase
Synonyms Uppercase
Type Families Uppercase

Modules
A module consists of a set of imports and exports and when compiled generates an interface which is linked against other
Haskell modules. A module may reexport symbols from other modules.

-- A module starts with its export declarations of symbols declared in this file.
module MyModule (myExport1, myExport2) where

-- Followed by a set of imports of symbols from other files

import OtherModule (myImport1, myImport2)

-- Rest of the logic and definitions in the module follow

-- ...

Modules’ dependency graphs optionally may be cyclic (i.e. they import symbols from each other) through the use of a
boot file, but this is often best avoided if at all possible.
Various module import strategies exist. For instance, we may:
Import all symbols into the local namespace.
BASICS 34

import Data.List

Import select symbols into the local namespace:

import Data.List (nub, sort)

Import into the global namespace masking a symbol:

import Data.List hiding (nub)

Import symbols qualified under Data.Map namespace into the local namespace.

import qualified Data.Map

Import symbols qualified and reassigned to a custom namespace ( M , in the example below):

import qualified Data.Map as M

You may also dump multiple modules into the same namespace so long as the symbols do not clash:

import qualified Data.Map as M

import qualified Data.Map.Strict as M

A main module is a special module which reserves the name Main and has a mandatory export of type IO () which
is invoked when the executable is run.. This is the entry point from the system into a Haskell program.

module Main where

main = print "Hello World!"

Functions
Functions are the central construction in Haskell. A function f of two arguments x and y can be defined in a single
line as the left­hand and right­hand side of an equation:

f x y = x + y

This line defines a function named f of two arguments, which on the right­hand side adds and yields the result. Central
to the idea of functional programming is that computational functions should behave like mathematical functions. For
instance, consider this mathematical definition of the above Haskell function, which, aside from the parentheses, looks
the same:

f (x, y) = x + y

In Haskell, a function of two arguments need not necessarily be applied to two arguments. The result of applying only
the first argument is to yield another function to which later the second argument can be applied. For example, we can
define an add function and subsequently a single­argument inc function, by merely pre­applying 1 to add :
35 BASICS

add x y = x + y
inc = add 1

λ: inc 4
5

In addition to named functions Haskell also has anonymous lambda functions denoted with a backslash. For example
the identity function:

id x = x

Is identical to:

id = \x -> x

Functions may call themselves or other functions as arguments; a feature known as higher­order functions. For example
the following function applies a given argument f , which is itself a function, to a value x twice.

applyTwice f x = f (f x)

Types
Typed functional programming is essential to the modern Haskell paradigm. But what are types precisely?
The syntax of a programming language is described by the constructs that define its types, and its semantics are described
by the interactions among those constructs. A type system overlays additional structure on top of the syntax that imposes
constraints on the formation of expressions based on the context in which they occur.
Dynamic programming languages associate types with values at evaluation, whereas statically typed languages associate
types to expressions before evaluation. Dynamic languages are in a sense as statically typed as static languages, however
they have a degenerate type system with only one type.
The dominant philosophy in functional programming is to “make invalid states unrepresentable” at compile­time, rather
than performing massive amounts of runtime checks. To this end Haskell has developed a rich type system that is based
on typed lambda calculus known as Girard’s System­F (See Rank­N Types) and has incrementally added extensions to
support more type­level programming over the years.
The following ground types are quite common:
• () ­ The unit type
• Char ­ A single unicode character (“code point”)
• Text ­ Unicode strings
• Bool ­ Boolean values
• Int ­ Machine integers
• Integer ­ GMP arbitrary precision integers
• Float ­ Machine floating point values
• Double ­ Machine double floating point values

Parameterised types consist of a type and several type parameters indicated as lower case type variables. These are associated
with common data structures such as lists and tuples.
• [a] – Homogeneous lists with elements of type a
BASICS 36

• (a,b) – Tuple with two elements of types a and b

• (a,b,c) – Tuple with three elements of types a , b , and c

The type system grows quite a bit from here, but these are the foundational types you’ll first encounter. See the later
chapters for all types off advanced features that can be optionally turned on.

This tutorial will only cover a small amount of the theory of type systems. For a more thorough treatment of the subject there
are two canonical texts:

• Pierce, B. C., & Benjamin, C. (2002). Types and Programming Languages. MIT Press.
• Harper, R. (2016). Practical Foundations for Programming Languages. Cambridge University Press.

Type Signatures
A toplevel Haskell function consists of two lines. The value­level definition which is a function name, followed by its
arguments on the left­hand side of the equals sign, and then the function body which computes the value it yields on
the right­hand side:

myFunction x y = x ^ 2 + y ^ 2
-- ^ ^ ^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
-- | | | |
-- | | | +-- function body
-- | | +------ second argument
-- | +-------- first argument
-- +-------------- function

The type­level definition is the function name followed by the type of its arguments separated by arrows, and the final
term is the type of the entire function body, meaning the type of value yielded by the function itself.

myFunction :: Int -> Int -> Int

-- ^ ^ ^ ^^^^^
-- | | | |
-- | | | +- return type
-- | | +------ second argument
-- | +------------ first argument
-- +----------------------- function

Here is a simple example of a function which adds two integers.

add :: Integer -> Integer -> Integer

add x y = x + y

Functions are also capable of invoking other functions inside of their function bodies:

inc :: Integer -> Integer

inc = add 1

The simplest function, called the identity function, is a function which takes a single value and simply returns it back.
This is an example of a polymorphic function since it can handle values of any type. The identity function works just as
well over strings as over integers.
37 BASICS

id :: a -> a
id x = x

This can alternatively be written in terms of an anonymous lambda function which is a backslash followed by a space­
separated list of arguments, followed by a function body.

id :: a -> a
id = \x -> x

One of the big ideas in functional programming is that functions are themselves first class values which can be passed to
other functions as arguments themselves. For example the applyTwice function takes an argument f which is of type
( a -> a ) and it applies that function over a given value x twice and yields the result. applyTwice is a higher­order
function which will transform one function into another function.

applyTwice :: (a -> a) -> a -> a

applyTwice f x = f (f x)

Often to the left of a type signature you will see a big arrow => which denotes a set of constraints over the type signature.
Each of these constraints will be in uppercase and will normally mention at least one of the type variables on the right
hand side of the arrow. These constraints can mean many things but in the simplest form they denote that a type variable
must have an implementation of a type class. The add function below operates over any two similar values x and y ,
but these values must have a numerical interface for adding them together.

add :: (Num a) => a -> a -> a

add x y = x + y

Type signatures can also appear at the value level in the form of explicit type signatures which are denoted in parentheses.

add1 :: Int -> Int

add1 x = x + (1 :: Int)

These are sometimes needed to provide additional hints to the typechecker when specific terms are ambiguous to the
typechecker, or when additional language extensions have been enabled which don’t have precise inference methods for
deducing all type variables.

Currying
In other languages functions normally have an arity which prescribes the number of arguments a function can take. Some
languages have fixed arity (like Fortran) others have flexible arity (like Python) where a variable of number of arguments
can be passed. Haskell follows a very simple rule: all functions in Haskell take a single argument. For multi­argument
functions (some of which we’ve already seen), arguments will be individually applied until the function is saturated and
the function body is evaluated.
For example, the add function from above can be partially applied to produce an add1 function:

add :: Int -> Int -> Int

add x y = x + y
BASICS 38

add1 :: Int -> Int

add1 = add 1

Uncurrying is the process of taking a function which takes two arguments and transforming it into a function which takes
a tuple of arguments. The Haskell prelude includes both a curry and an uncurry function for transforming functions
into those that take multiple arguments from those that take a tuple of arguments and vice versa:

curry :: ((a, b) -> c) -> a -> b -> c

uncurry :: (a -> b -> c) -> (a, b) -> c

For example, uncurry applied to the add function creates a function that takes a tuple of integers:

uncurryAdd :: (Int, Int) -> Int

uncurryAdd = uncurry add

example :: Int
example = uncurryAdd (1,2)

Algebraic Datatypes
Custom datatypes in Haskell are defined with the data keyword followed by the the type name, its parameters, and
then a set of constructors. The possible constructors are either sum types or of product types. All datatypes in Haskell can
expressed as sums of products. A sum type is a set of options that is delimited by a pipe.
A datatype can only ever be inhabited by only single value from a sum type and intuitively models a set of “options” a
value may take. While a product type is a combination of a set of typed values, potentially named by record fields. For
example the following are two definitions of a Point product type, the latter with two fields x and y .

data Point = Point Int Int

data Point = Point { x :: Int, y :: Int }

As another example: A deck of common playing cards could be modeled by the following set of product and sum types:

data Suit = Clubs | Diamonds | Hearts | Spades

data Color = Red | Back
data Value
= Two
| Three
| Four
| Five
| Six
| Seven
| Eight
| Nine
| Ten
| Jack
| Queen
| King
| Ace
39 BASICS

deriving (Eq, Ord)

A record type can use these custom datatypes to define all the parameters that define an individual playing card.

data Card = Card

{ suit :: Suit
, color :: Color
, value :: Value
}

Some example values:

queenDiamonds :: Card
queenDiamonds = Card Diamonds Red Queen

-- Alternatively
queenDiamonds :: Card
queenDiamonds = Card { suit = Diamonds, color = Red, value = Queen }

The problem with the definition of this datatype is that it admits several values which are malformed. For instance it is
possible to instantiate a Card with a suit Hearts but with color Black which is an invalid value. The convention for
preventing these kind of values in Haskell is to limit the export of constructors in a module and only provide a limited
set of functions which the module exports, which can enforce these constraints. These are smart constructors and an
extremely common pattern in Haskell library design. For example we can export functions for building up specific suit
cards that enforce the color invariant.

module Cards (Card, diamond, spade, heart, club) where

diamond :: Value -> Card

diamond = Card Diamonds Red

spade :: Value -> Card

spade = Card Spades Black

heart :: Value -> Card

heart = Card Hearts Red

club :: Value -> Card

club = Card Clubs Black

Datatypes may also be recursive, in the sense that they can contain themselves as fields. The most common example is
a linked list which can be defined recursively as either an empty list or a value linked to a potentially nested version of
itself.

data List a = Nil | List a (List a)

An example value would look like:

list :: List Integer

list = List 1 (List 2 (List 3 Nil))
BASICS 40

Constructors for datatypes can also be defined as infix symbols. This is somewhat rare, but is sometimes used in more
math heavy libraries. For example the constructor for our list type could be defined as the infix operator :+: . When
the value is printed using a Show instance, the operator will be printed in infix form.

data List a = Nil | a :+: (List a)

Lists
Linked lists or cons lists are a fundamental data structure in functional programming. GHC has builtin syntactic sugar
in the form of list syntax which allows us to write lists that expand into explicit invocations of the cons operator (:) .
The operator is right associative and an example is shown below:

[1,2,3] = 1 : 2 : 3 : []
[1,2,3] = 1 : (2 : (3 : [])) -- with explicit parens

This syntax also extends to the typelevel where lists are represented as brackets around the type of values they contain.

myList1 :: [Int]
myList1 = [1,2,3]

myList2 :: [Bool]
myList2 = [True, True, False]

The cons operator itself has the type signature which takes a head element as its first argument and a tail argument as its
second.

(:) :: a -> [a] -> [a]

The Data.List module from the standard Prelude defines a variety of utility functions for operations over linked lists.
For example the length function returns the integral length of the number of elements in the linked list.

length :: [a] -> Int

While the take function extracts a fixed number of elements from the list.

take :: Int -> [a] -> [a]

Both of these functions are pure and return a new list without modifying the underlying list passed as an argument.

Another function iterate is an example of a function which returns an infinite list. It takes as its first argument a
function and then repeatedly applies that function to produce a new element of the linked list.

iterate :: (a -> a) -> a -> [a]

Consuming these infinite lists can be used as a control flow construct to construct loops. For example instead of writing
an explicit loop, as we would in other programming languages, we instead construct a function which generates list
elements. For example producing a list which produces subsequent powers of two:
41 BASICS

powersOfTwo = iterate (2*) 1

We can then use the take function to evaluate this lazy stream to a desired depth.

λ: take 15 powersOfTwo
[1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192,16384]

An equivalent loop in an imperative language would look like the following.

def powersOfTwo(n):
square_list = [1]
for i in range(1,n+1):
square_list.append(2 ** i)
return square_list

print(powersOfTwo(15))

Pattern Matching
To unpack an algebraic datatype and extract its fields we’ll use a built in language construction known as pattern matching.
This is denoted by the case syntax and scrutinizes a specific value. A case expression will then be followed by a sequence
of matches which consist of a pattern on the left and an arbitrary expression on the right. The left patterns will all consist
of constructors for the type of the scrutinized value and should enumerate all possible constructors. For product type
patterns that are scrutinized a sequence of variables will bind the fields associated with its positional location in the
constructor. The types of all expressions on the right hand side of the matches must be identical.
Pattern matches can be written in explicit case statements or in toplevel functional declarations. The latter simply expands
the former in the desugaring phase of the compiler.

data Example = Example Int Int Int

example1 :: Example -> Int

example1 x = case x of
Example a b c -> a + b + c

example2 :: Example -> Int

example2 (Example a b c) = a + b +c

Following on the playing card example in the previous section, we could use a pattern to produce a function which scores
the face value of a playing card.

value :: Value -> Integer

value card = case card of
Two -> 2
Three -> 3
Four -> 4
Five -> 5
Six -> 6
Seven -> 7
BASICS 42

Eight -> 8
Nine -> 9
Ten -> 10
Jack -> 10
Queen -> 10
King -> 10
Ace -> 1

And we can use a double pattern match to produce a function which determines which suit trumps another suit. For
example we can introduce an order of suits of cards where the ranking of cards proceeds (Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts,
Spaces). A _ underscore used inside a pattern indicates a wildcard pattern and matches against any constructor given.
This should be the last pattern used a in match list.

suitBeats :: Suit -> Suit -> Bool

suitBeats Clubs Diamonds = True
suitBeats Clubs Hearts = True
suitBeats Clubs Spaces = True
suitBeats Diamonds Hearts = True
suitBeats Diamonds Spades = True
suitBeats Hearts Spades = True
suitBeats _ _ = False

And finally we can write a function which determines if another card beats another card in terms of the two pattern
matching functions above. The following pattern match brings the values of the record into the scope of the function
body assigning to names specified in the pattern syntax.

beats :: Card -> Card -> Bool

beats (Card suit1 color1 value1) (Card suit2 color2 value2) =
(suitBeats suit1 suit2) && (value1 > value2)

Functions may also invoke themselves. This is known as recursion. This is quite common in pattern matching definitions
which recursively tear down or build up data structures. This kind of pattern is one of the defining modes of programming
functionally.

The following two recursive pattern matches are desugared forms of each other:

fib :: Integer -> Integer

fib 0 = 0
fib 1 = 1
fib n = fib (n-1) + fib (n-2)

fib :: Integer -> Integer

fib m = case m of
0 -> 0
1 -> 1
n -> fib (n-1) + fib(n-2)

Pattern matching on lists is also an extremely common pattern. It has special pattern syntax and the tail variable is
typically pluralized. In the following x denotes the head variable and xs denotes the tail. For example the following
function traverses a list of integers and adds (+1) to each value.
43 BASICS

addOne :: [Int] -> [Int]

addOne (x : xs) = (x+1) : (addOne xs)
addOne [] = []

Guards
Guard statements are expressions that evaluate to boolean values that can be used to restrict pattern matches. These occur
in a pattern match statements at the toplevel with the pipe syntax on the left indicating the guard condition. The special
otherwise condition is just a renaming of the boolean value True exported from Prelude.

absolute :: Int -> Int

absolute n
| n < 0 = (-n)
| otherwise = n

Guards can also occur in pattern case expressions.

absoluteJust :: Maybe Int -> Maybe Int

absoluteJust n = case n of
Nothing -> Nothing
Just n
| n < 0 -> Just (-n)
| otherwise -> Just n

Operators and Sections

An operator is a function that can be applied using infix syntax or partially applied using a section. Operators can be
defined to use any combination of the special ASCII symbols or any unicode symbol.
! # % & * + . / < = > ? @ \ ^ | - ~ :

The following are reserved syntax and cannot be overloaded:

.. : :: = \ | <- -> @ ~ =>

Operators are of one of three fixity classes.

• Infix ­ Place between expressions
• Prefix ­ Placed before expressions
• Postfix ­ Placed after expressions. See Postfix Operators.
Expressions involving infix operators are disambiguated by the operator’s fixity and precedence. Infix operators are either
left or right associative. Associativity determines how operators of the same precedence are grouped in the absence of
parentheses.

a + b + c + d = ((a + b) + c) + d -- left associative

a + b + c + d = a + (b + (c + d)) -- right associative

Precedence and associativity are denoted by fixity declarations for the operator using either infixr infixl and
infix . The standard operators defined in the Prelude have the following precedence table.
BASICS 44

infixr 9 .
infixr 8 ^, ^^, **
infixl 7 *, /, `quot`, `rem`, `div`, `mod`
infixl 6 +, -
infixr 5 ++
infix 4 ==, /=, <, <=, >=, >
infixr 3 &&
infixr 2 ||
infixr 1 >>, >>=
infixr 0 $, `seq`

Sections are written as ( op e ) or ( e op ) . For example:

(+1) 3
(1+) 3

Operators written within enclosed parens are applied like traditional functions. For example the following are equivalent:

(+) x y = x + y

Tuples
Tuples are heterogeneous structures which contain a fixed number of values. Some simple examples are shown below:

-- 2-tuple
tuple2 :: (Integer, String)
tuple2 = (1, "foo")

-- 3-tuple
tuple3 :: (Integer, Integer, Integer)
tuple3 = (10, 20, 30)

For two­tuples there are two functions fst and snd which extract the left and right values respectively.

fst :: (a,b) -> a

snd :: (a,b) -> b

GHC supports tuples to size 62.

Where & Let Clauses

Haskell syntax contains two different types of declaration syntax: let and where . A let binding is an expression and
binds anywhere in its body. For example the following let binding declares x and y in the expression x+y .

f = let x = 1; y = 2 in (x+y)
45 BASICS

A where binding is a toplevel syntax construct (i.e. not an expression) that binds variables at the end of a function. For
example the following binds x and y in the function body of f which is x+y .

f = x+y where x=1; y=1

Where clauses following the Haskell layout rule where definitions can be listed on newlines so long as the definitions have
greater indentation than the first toplevel definition they are bound to.

f = x+y
where
x = 1
y = 1

Conditionals
Haskell has builtin syntax for scrutinizing boolean expressions. These are first class expressions known as if statements.
An if statement is of the form if cond then trueCond else falseCond . Both the True and False statements
must be present.

absolute :: Int -> Int

absolute n =
if (n < 0)
then (-n)
else n

If statements are just syntactic sugar for case expressions over boolean values. The following example is equivalent to
the above example.

absolute :: Int -> Int

absolute n = case (n < 0) of
True -> (-n)
False -> n

Function Composition
Functions are obviously at the heart of functional programming. In mathematics function composition is an operation
which takes two functions and produces another function with the result of the first argument function applied to the
result of the second function. This is written in mathematical notation as:

g◦f

The two functions operate over a domain. For example X, Y and Z.

f :X→Y g:Y →Z

Or in Haskell notation:
BASICS 46

f :: X -> Y
g :: Y -> Z

Composition operation results in a new function:

g◦f :X →Z

In Haskell this operator is given special infix operator to appear similar to the mathematical notation. Intuitively it
takes two functions of types b -> c and a -> b and composes them together to produce a new function. This is the
canonical example of a higher­order function.

(.) :: (b -> c) -> (a -> b) -> a -> c

f . g = \x -> f (g x)

Haskell code will liberally use this operator to compose chains of functions. For example the following composes a chain
of list processing functions sort , filter and map :

example :: [Integer] -> [Integer]

example =
sort
. filter (<100)
. map (*10)

Another common higher­order function is the flip function which takes as its first argument a function of two argu­
ments, and reverses the order of these two arguments returning a new function.

flip :: (a -> b -> c) -> b -> a -> c

The most common operator in all of Haskell is function application operator $ . This function is right associative and
takes the entire expression on the right hand side of the operator and applies it to function on the left.

infixr 0 $
($) :: (a -> b) -> a -> b

This is quite often used in the pattern where the left hand side is a composition of other functions applied to a single argu­
ment. This is common in point­free style of programming which attempts to minimize the number of input arguments
in favour of pure higher order function composition. The flipped form of this function does the opposite and is left
associative, and applies the entire left hand side expression to a function given in the second argument to the function.

infixl 1 &
(&) :: a -> (a -> b) -> b

For comparison consider the use of $ , & and explicit parentheses.

ex1 = f1 . f2 . f3 . f4 $ input -- with ($)

ex1 = input & f1 . f2 . f3 . f4 -- with (&)
ex1 = (f1 . f2 . f3 . f4) input -- with explicit parens
47 BASICS

The on function takes a function b and yields the result of applying unary function u to two arguments x and y .
This is a higher order function that transforms two inputs and combines the outputs.

on :: (b -> b -> c) -> (a -> b) -> a -> a -> c

This is used quite often in sort functions. For example we can write a custom sort function which sorts a list of lists based
on length.

λ: import Data.List
λ: sortSize = sortBy (compare `on` length)
λ: sortSize [[1,2], [1,2,3], [1]]
[[1],[1,2],[1,2,3]]

List Comprehensions
List comprehensions are a syntactic construct that first originated in the Haskell language and has now spread to other
programming languages. List comprehensions provide a simple way of working with lists and sequences of values that
follow patterns. List comprehension syntax consists of three components:

• Generators ­ Expressions which evaluate a list of values which are iteratively added to the result.
• Let bindings ­ Expressions which generate a constant value which is scoped on each iteration.
• Guards ­ Expressions which generate a boolean expression which determine whether an iteration is added to the
result.

The simplest generator is simply a list itself. The following example produces a list of integral values, each element
multiplied by two.

λ: [2*x | x <- [1,2,3,4,5]]

-- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
-- Generator
[2,4,6,8,10]

We can extend this by adding a let statement which generalizes the multiplier on each step and binds it to a variable n .

λ: [n*x | x <- [1,2,3,4,5], let n = 3]

-- ^^^^^^^^^
-- Let binding
[3,6,9,12,15]

And we can also restrict the set of resulting values to only the subset of values of x that meet a condition. In this case
we restrict to only values of x which are odd.

λ: [n*x | x <- [1,2,3,4,5], let n = 3, odd x]

-- ^^^^^
-- Guard
[3,9,15]

Comprehensions with multiple generators will combine each generator pairwise to produce the cartesian product of all
results.
BASICS 48

λ: [(x,y) | x <- [1,2,3], y <- [10,20,30]]

[(1,10),(1,20),(1,30),(2,10),(2,20),(2,30),(3,10),(3,20),(3,30)]

λ: [(x,y,z) | x <- [1,2], y <- [10,20], z <- [100,200]]

[(1,10,100),(1,10,200),(1,20,100),(1,20,200),(2,10,100),(2,10,200),(2,20,100),(2,20,200)]

Haskell has builtin comprehension syntax which is syntactic sugar for specific methods of the Enum typeclass.

Syntax Sugar Enum Class Method

[ e1.. ] enumFrom e1
[ e1,e2.. ] enumFromThen e1 e2
[ e1..e3 ] enumFromTo e1 e3
[ e1,e2..e3 ] enumFromThenTo e1 e2 e3

There is an Enum instance for Integer and Char types and so we can write list comprehensions for both, which
generate ranges of values.

λ: [1 .. 15]
[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]

λ: ['a' .. 'z']
"abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"

λ: [1,3 .. 15]
[1,3,5,7,9,11,13,15]

λ: [0,50..500]
[0,50,100,150,200,250,300,350,400,450,500]

These comprehensions can be used inside of function definitions and reference locally bound variables. For example the
factorial function (written as n!) is defined as the product of all positive integers up to a given value.

factorial :: Integer -> Integer

factorial n = product [1..n]

As a more complex example consider a naive prime number sieve:

primes :: [Integer]
primes = sieve [2..]
where
sieve (p:xs) = p : sieve [ n | n <- xs, n `mod` p > 0 ]

And a more complex example, consider the classic FizzBuzz interview question. This makes use of iteration and guard
statements.

fizzbuzz :: [String]
fizzbuzz = [fb x| x <- [1..100]]
where fb y
49 BASICS

| y `mod` 15 == 0 = "FizzBuzz"
| y `mod` 3 == 0 = "Fizz"
| y `mod` 5 == 0 = "Buzz"
| otherwise = show y

Comments
Single line comments begin with double dashes -- :

-- Everything should be built top-down, except the first time.

Multiline comments begin with {- and end with -} .

{-
The goal of computation is the emulation of our synthetic abilities, not the
understanding of our analytic ones.
-}

Comments may also add additional structure in the form of Haddock docstrings. These comments will begin with a
pipe.

{-|
Great ambition without contribution is without significance.
-}

Modules may also have a comment convention which describes the individual authors, copyright and stability informa­
tion in the following form:

{-|
Module : MyEnterpriseModule
Description : Make it so.
Copyright : (c) Jean Luc Picard
License : MIT
Maintainer : [email protected]
Stability : experimental
Portability : POSIX

Description of module structure in Haddock markup style.

-}

Typeclasses
Typeclasses are one of the core abstractions in Haskell. Just as we wrote polymorphic functions above which operate over
all given types (the id function is one example), we can use typeclasses to provide a form of bounded polymorphism
which constrains type variables to a subset of those types that implement a given class.
For example we can define an equality class which allows us to define an overloaded notion of equality depending on the
data structure provided.
BASICS 50

class Equal a where

equal :: a -> a -> Bool

Then we can define this typeclass over several different types. These definitions are called typeclass instances. For example
for the Bool type the equality typeclass would be defined as:

instance Equal Bool where

equal True True = True
equal False False = True
equal True False = False
equal False True = False

Over the unit type, where only a single value exists, the instance is trivial:

instance Equal () where

equal () () = True

For the Ordering type, defined as:

data Ordering = LT | EQ | GT

We would have the following Equal instance:

instance Equal Ordering where

equal LT LT = True
equal EQ EQ = True
equal GT GT = True
equal _ _ = False

An Equal instance for a more complex data structure like the list type relies upon the fact that the type of the elements
in the list must also have a notion of equality, so we include this as a constraint in the typeclass context, which is written
to the left of the fat arrow => . With this constraint in place, we can write this instance recursively by pattern matching
on the list elements and checking for equality all the way down the spine of the list:

instance (Equal a) => Equal [a] where

equal [] [] = True -- Empty lists are equal
equal [] ys = False -- Lists of unequal size are not equal
equal xs [] = False
-- equal x y is only allowed here due to the constraint (Equal a)
equal (x:xs) (y:ys) = equal x y && equal xs ys

In the above definition, we know that we can check for equality between individual list elements if those list elements
satisfy the Equal constraint. Knowing that they do, we can then check for equality between two complete lists.

For tuples, we will also include the Equal constraint for their elements, and we can then check each element for equality
respectively. Note that this instance includes two constraints in the context of the typeclass, requiring that both type
variables a and b must also have an Equal instance.
51 BASICS

instance (Equal a, Equal b) => Equal (a,b) where

equal (x0, x1) (y0, y1) = equal x0 y0 && equal x1 y1

The default prelude comes with a variety of typeclasses that are used frequently and defined over many prelude types:
• Num ­ Provides a basic numerical interface for values with addition, multiplication, subtraction, and negation.
• Eq ­ Provides an interface for values that can be tested for equality.
• Ord ­ Provides an interface for values that have a total ordering.
• Read ­ Provides an interface for values that can be read from a string.
• Show ­ Provides an interface for values that can be printed to a string.
• Enum ­ Provides an interface for values that are enumerable to integers.
• Semigroup ­ Provides an algebraic semigroup interface.
• Functor ­ Provides an algebraic functor interface. See Functors.
• Monad ­ Provides an algebraic monad interface. See Monads.
• Category ­ Provides an algebraic category interface. See Categories.
• Bounded ­ Provides an interface for enumerable values with bounds.
• Integral ­ Provides an interface for integral­like quantities.
• Real ­ Provides an interface for real­like quantities.
• Fractional ­ Provides an interface for rational­like quantities.
• Floating ­ Provides an interface for defining transcendental functions over real values.
• RealFrac ­ Provides an interface for rounding real values.
• RealFloat ­ Provides an interface for working with IEE754 operations.
To see the implementation for any of these typeclasses you can run the GHCi info command to see the methods and all
instances in scope. For example:

λ: :info Num
class (Eq a, Show a) => Num a where
(+) :: a -> a -> a
(*) :: a -> a -> a
(-) :: a -> a -> a
negate :: a -> a
abs :: a -> a
signum :: a -> a
fromInteger :: Integer -> a
-- Imported from GHC.Num
instance Num Float -- Imported from GHC.Float
instance Num Double -- Imported from GHC.Float
instance Num Integer -- Imported from GHC.Num
instance Num Int -- Imported from GHC.Num

Many of the default classes have instances that can be derived automatically. After the definition of a datatype you can
add a deriving clause which will generate the instances for this datatype automatically. This does not work universally
but for many instances which have boilerplate definitions, GHC is quite clever and can save you from writing quite a bit
of code by hand.
For example for a custom list type.

data List a
= Cons a (List a)
| Nil
deriving (Eq, Ord, Show)
BASICS 52

Side Effects
Contrary to a common misconception, side effects are an integral part of Haskell programming. Probably the most
interesting thing about Haskell’s approach to side effects is that they are encoded in the type system. This is certainly a
different approach to effectful programming, and the language has various models for modeling these effects within the
type system. These models range from using Monads to building algebraic models of effects that draw clear lines between
effectful code and pure code. The idea of reasoning about where effects can and cannot exist is one of the key ideas of
Haskell, but this certainly does not mean trying to avoid side effects altogether!

Indeed, a Hello World program in Haskell is quite simple:

main :: IO ()
main = print "Hello World"

Other side effects can include reading from the terminal and prompting the user for input, such as in the complete
program below:

main :: IO ()
main = do
print "Enter a number"
n <- getLine
print ("You entered: " ++ n)

Records
Records in Haskell are fundamentally broken for several reasons:

1. The syntax is unconventional.

Most programming languages use dot or arrow syntax for field accessors like the following:

person.name
person->name

Haskell however uses function application syntax since record accessors are simply just functions. Instead or creating
a privileged class of names and syntax for field accessors, Haskell instead choose to implement the simplest model and
expands accessors to function during compilation.

name person
person {name="foo"}

2. Incomplete pattern matches are implicitly generated for sums of products.

data Example = Ex1 { a :: Int } | Ex2 { b :: Int }

The functions generated for a or b in both of these cases are partial. See Exhaustiveness checking.

3. Lack of Namespacing

Given two records defined in the same module (or imported) GHC is unable to (by default) disambiguate which field
accessor to assign at a callsite that uses a .
53 BASICS

data Example1 = Ex1 { a :: Int }

data Example2 = Ex2 { a :: Int }

This can be routed around with the language extension DisambiguateRecordFields but only to a certain extent. If
we want to write maximally polymorphic functions which operate over arbitrary records which have a field a , then the
GHC typesystem is not able to express this without some much higher­level magic.

Pragmas
At the beginning of a module there is special syntax for pragmas which direct the compiler to compile the current module
in a specific way. The most common is a language extension pragma denoted like the following:

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

These flags alter the semantics and syntax of the module in a variety of ways. See Language Extensions for more details
on all of these options.

Additionally we can pass specific GHC flags which alter the compilation behavior, enabling or disabling specific bespoke
features based on our needs. These include compiler warnings, optimisation flags and extension flags.

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -fwarn-incomplete-patterns #-}

Warning flags allow you to inform users at compile­time with a custom error message. Additionally you can mark a
module as deprecated with a specific replacement message.

module Widget {-# DEPRECATED "This module is deprecated." #-}

module Widget {-# WARNING "This module is dangerous." #-}

Newtypes
Newtypes are a form of zero­cost abstraction that allows developers to specify compile­time names for types for which
the developer wishes to expose a more restrictive interface. They’re zero­cost because these newtypes end up with the
same underlying representation as the things they differentiate. This allows the compiler to distinguish between different
types which are representationally identical but semantically different.

For instance velocity can be represented as a scalar quantity represented as a double but the user may not want to mix
doubles with other vector quantities. Newtypes allow us to distinguish between scalars and vectors at compile time so
that no accidental calculations can occur.

newtype Velocity = Velocity Double

Most importantly these newtypes disappear during compilation and the velocity type will be represented as simply just
a machine double with no overhead.

See also the section on Newtype Deriving for a further discussion of tricks involved with handling newtypes.
BASICS 54

Bottoms
The bottom is a singular value that inhabits every type. When this value is evaluated, the semantics of Haskell no longer
yield a meaningful value. In other words, further operations on the value cannot be defined in Haskell. A bottom value
is usually written as the symbol ⊥, ( i.e. the compiler flipping you off ). Several ways exist to express bottoms in Haskell
code.

For instance, undefined is an easily called example of a bottom value. This function has type a but lacks any type
constraints in its type signature. Thus, undefined is able to stand in for any type in a function body, allowing type
checking to succeed, even if the function is incomplete or lacking a definition entirely. The undefined function is
extremely practical for debugging or to accommodate writing incomplete programs.

undefined :: a

mean :: Num a => Vector a -> a

mean nums = (total / count) where -- Partially defined function
total = undefined
count = undefined

addThreeNums :: Num a => a -> a -> a -> a

addThreeNums n m j = undefined -- No function body declared at all

f :: a -> Complicated Type

f = undefined -- Write tomorrow, typecheck today!
-- Arbitrarily complicated types
-- welcome!

Another example of a bottom value comes from the evaluation of the error function, which takes a String and
returns something that can be of any type. This property is quite similar to undefined , which also can also stand in
for any type.

Calling error in a function causes the compiler to throw an exception, halt the program, and print the specified error
message.

error :: String -> a -- Takes an error message of type

-- String and returns whatever type
-- is needed

In the divByY function below, passing the function 0 as the divisor results in this function returning such an exception.

-- Annotated code that features use of the error function.

divByY:: (Num a, Eq a, Fractional a) => a -> a -> a

divByY _ 0 = error "Divide by zero error" -- Dividing by 0 causes an error
divByY dividend divisor = dividend / divisor -- Handles defined division

A third type way to express a bottom is with an infinitely looping term:

f :: a
f = let x = x in x
55 BASICS

Examples of actual Haskell code that use this looping syntax lives in the source code of the GHC.Prim module. These
bottoms exist because the operations cannot be defined in native Haskell. Such operations are baked into the compiler at
a very low level. However, this module exists so that Haddock can generate documentation for these primitive operations,
while the looping syntax serves as a placeholder for the actual implementation of the primops.
Perhaps the most common introduction to bottoms is writing a partial function that does not have exhaustive pattern
matching defined. For example, the following code has non­exhaustive pattern matching because the case expression,
lacks a definition of what to do with a B :

data F = A | B

case x of
A -> ()

The code snippet above is translated into the following GHC Core output where the compiler will insert an exception
to account for the non­exhaustive patterns:

case x of _ {
A -> ();
B -> patError "<interactive>:3:11-31|case"
}

GHC can be made more vocal about incomplete patterns using the -fwarn-incomplete-patterns and
-fwarn-incomplete-uni-patterns flags.

A similar situation can arise with records. Although constructing a record with missing fields is rarely useful, it is still
possible.

data Foo = Foo { example1 :: Int }

f = Foo {} -- Record defined with a missing field

When the developer omits a field’s definition, the compiler inserts an exception in the GHC Core representation:

Foo (recConError "<interactive>:4:9-12|a")

Fortunately, GHC will warn us by default about missing record fields.

Bottoms are used extensively throughout the Prelude, although this fact may not be immediately apparent. The reasons
for including bottoms are either practical or historical.
The canonical example is the head function which has type [a] -> a . This function could not be well­typed without
the bottom.

-- | Extract the first element of a list, which must be non-empty.

head :: [a] -> a
head (x:_) = x
head [] = error "Prelude.head: empty list"

Some further examples of bottoms:

import GHC.Err
import Prelude hiding (head, (!!), undefined)
BASICS 56

-- degenerate functions

undefined :: a
undefined = error "Prelude.undefined"

head :: [a] -> a

head (x:_) = x
head [] = error "Prelude.head: empty list"

(!!) :: [a] -> Int -> a

xs !! n | n < 0 = error "Prelude.!!: negative index"
[] !! _ = error "Prelude.!!: index too large"
(x:_) !! 0 = x
(_:xs) !! n = xs !! (n-1)

It is rare to see these partial functions thrown around carelessly in production code because they cause the program to
halt. The preferred method for handling exceptions is to combine the use of safe variants provided in Data.Maybe with
the functions maybe and either .

Another method is to use pattern matching, as shown in listToMaybe , a safer version of head described below:

listToMaybe :: [a] -> Maybe a

listToMaybe [] = Nothing -- An empty list returns Nothing
listToMaybe (a:_) = Just a -- A non-empty list returns the first element
-- wrapped in the Just context.

Invoking a bottom defined in terms of error typically will not generate any position information. However, assert ,
which is used to provide assertions, can be short­circuited to generate position information in place of either undefined
or error calls.

import GHC.Base

foo :: a
foo = undefined
-- *** Exception: Prelude.undefined

bar :: a
bar = assert False undefined
-- *** Exception: src/fail.hs:8:7-12: Assertion failed

See: Avoiding Partial Functions

Exhaustiveness
Pattern matching in Haskell allows for the possibility of non­exhaustive patterns. For example, passing Nothing to
unsafe will cause the program to crash at runtime. However, this function is an otherwise valid, type­checked program.

unsafe :: Num a => Maybe a -> Maybe a

unsafe (Just x) = Just $ x + 1
57 BASICS

Since unsafe takes a Maybe a value as its argument, two possible values are valid input: Nothing and Just a .
Since the case of a Nothing was not defined in unsafe , we say that the pattern matching within that function is
non­exhaustive. In other words, the function does not implement appropriate handling of all valid inputs. Instead of
yielding a value, such a function will halt from an incomplete match.

Partial functions from non­exhaustivity are a controversial subject, and frequent use of non­exhaustive patterns is con­
sidered a dangerous code smell. However, the complete removal of non­exhaustive patterns from the language would
itself be too restrictive and forbid too many valid programs.

Several flags exist that we can pass to the compiler to warn us about such patterns or forbid them entirely, either locally
or globally.

$ ghc -c -Wall -Werror A.hs

A.hs:3:1:
Warning: Pattern match(es) are non-exhaustive
In an equation for `unsafe': Patterns not matched: Nothing

The -Wall or -fwarn-incomplete-patterns flag can also be added on a per­module basis by using the
OPTIONS_GHC pragma.

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -Wall #-}

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -fwarn-incomplete-patterns #-}

A more subtle case of non­exhaustivity is the use of implicit pattern matching with a single uni­pattern in a lambda
expression. In a manner similar to the unsafe function above, a uni­pattern cannot handle all types of valid input. For
instance, the function boom will fail when given a Nothing, even though the type of the lambda expression’s argument
is a Maybe a .

boom = \(Just a) -> something

Non­exhaustivity arising from uni­patterns in lambda expressions occurs frequently in let or do ­blocks after desug­
aring, because such code is translated into lambda expressions similar to boom .

boom2 = let
Just a = something

boom3 = do
Just a <- something

GHC can warn about these cases of non­exhaustivity with the -fwarn-incomplete-uni-patterns flag.

Generally speaking, any non­trivial program will use some measure of partial functions. It is simply a fact. Thus, there
exist obligations for the programmer that cannot be manifested in the Haskell type system.

Debugger
Since GHC version 6.8.1, a built­in debugger has been available, although its use is somewhat rare. Debugging uncaught
exceptions is in a similar style to debugging segfaults with gdb. Breakpoints can be set :break and the call stack stepped
through with :forward and :back .
BASICS 58

λ: :set -fbreak-on-exception -- Sets option for evaluation to stop on exception

λ: :break 2 15 -- Sets a break point at line 2, column 15
λ: :trace main -- Run a function to generate a sequence of evaluation steps
λ: :hist -- Step back from a breakpoint through previous evaluation steps
λ: :back -- Step backwards a single step at a time through the history
λ: :forward -- Step forward a single step at a time through the history

Stack Traces
With runtime profiling enabled, GHC can also print a stack trace when a diverging bottom term (error, undefined) is
hit. This action, though, requires a special flag and profiling to be enabled, both of which are disabled by default. So,
for example:

import Control.Exception

f x = g x

g x = error (show x)

main = try (evaluate (f ())) :: IO (Either SomeException ())

$ ghc -O0 -rtsopts=all -prof -auto-all --make stacktrace.hs

./stacktrace +RTS -xc

And indeed, the runtime tells us that the exception occurred in the function g and enumerates the call stack.

*** Exception (reporting due to +RTS -xc): (THUNK_2_0), stack trace:

Main.g,
called from Main.f,
called from Main.main,
called from Main.CAF
--> evaluated by: Main.main,
called from Main.CAF

It is best to run this code without optimizations applied -O0 so as to preserve the original call stack as represented in
the source. With optimizations applied, GHC will rearrange the program in rather drastic ways, resulting in what may
be an entirely different call stack.

Printf Tracing
Since Haskell is a pure language it has the unique property that most code is introspectable on its own. As such, using
printf to display the state of the program at critical times throughout execution is often unnecessary because we can
simply open GHCi and test the function. Nevertheless, Haskell does come with an unsafe trace function which can
be used to perform arbitrary print statements outside of the IO monad. You can place these statements wherever you
like in your code without without IO restrictions.
59 BASICS

import Debug.Trace

example1 :: Int
example1 = trace "impure print" 1

example2 :: Int
example2 = traceShow "tracing" 2

example3 :: [Int]
example3 = [trace "will not be called" 3]

main :: IO ()
main = do
print example1
print example2
print $ length example3
-- impure print
-- 1
-- "tracing"
-- 2
-- 1

Trace uses unsafePerformIO under the hood and should not be used in production code.

In addition to the trace function, several monadic trace variants are quite common.

import Text.Printf
import Debug.Trace

traceM :: (Monad m) => String -> m ()

traceM string = trace string $ return ()

traceShowM :: (Show a, Monad m) => a -> m ()

traceShowM = traceM . show

tracePrintfM :: (Monad m, PrintfArg a) => String -> a -> m ()

tracePrintfM s = traceM . printf s

Type Inference
While inference in Haskell is usually complete, there are cases where the principal type cannot be inferred. Three common
cases are:

• Reduced polymorphism due to mutually recursive binding groups

• Undecidability due to polymorphic recursion
• Reduced polymorphism due to the monomorphism restriction

In each of these cases, Haskell needs a hint from the programmer, which may be provided by adding explicit type
signatures.
BASICS 60

Mutually Recursive Binding Groups

f x = const x g
g y = f 'A'

In this case, the inferred type signatures are correct in their usage, but they don’t represent the most general signatures.
When GHC analyzes the module it analyzes the dependencies of expressions on each other, groups them together, and
applies substitutions from unification across mutually defined groups. As such the inferred types may not be the most
general types possible, and an explicit signature may be desired.

-- Inferred types
f :: Char -> Char
g :: t -> Char

-- Most general types

f :: a -> a
g :: a -> Char

Polymorphic recursion

data Tree a = Leaf | Bin a (Tree (a, a))

size Leaf = 0
size (Bin _ t) = 1 + 2 * size t

In the second case, recursion is polymorphic because the inferred type variable a in size spans two possible types ( a
and (a,a) ). These two types won’t pass the occurs­check of the typechecker and it yields an incorrect inferred type:

Occurs check: cannot construct the infinite type: t0 = (t0, t0)

Expected type: Tree t0
Actual type: Tree (t0, t0)
In the first argument of `size', namely `t'
In the second argument of `(*)', namely `size t'
In the second argument of `(+)', namely `2 * size t'

Simply adding an explicit type signature corrects this. Type inference using polymorphic recursion is undecidable in the
general case.

size :: Tree a -> Int

size Leaf = 0
size (Bin _ t) = 1 + 2 * size t

See: Static Semantics of Function and Pattern Bindings

Monomorphism Restriction
Finally Monomorphism restriction is a builtin typing rule. By default, it is turned on when compiling and off in GHCi.
The practical effect of this rule is that types inferred for functions without explicit type signatures may be more specific
than expected. This is because GHC will sometimes reduce a general type, such as Num to a default type, such as
Double . This can be seen in the following example in GHCi:
61 BASICS

λ: :set +t

λ: 3
3
it :: Num a => a

λ: default (Double)

λ: 3
3.0
it :: Num a => a

This rule may be deactivated with the NoMonomorphicRestriction extension, see below.
See:
• Monomorphism Restriction

Type Holes
Since the release of GHC 7.8, type holes allow underscores as stand­ins for actual values. They may be used either in
declarations or in type signatures.
Type holes are useful in debugging incomplete programs. By placing an underscore on any value on the right hand­side
of a declaration, GHC will throw an error during type­checking. The error message describes which values may legally
fill the type hole.

head' = head _

typedhole.hs:3:14: error:
r Found hole: _ :: [a]
Where: ‘a’ is a rigid type variable bound by
the inferred type of head' :: a at typedhole.hs:3:1
r In the first argument of ‘head’, namely ‘_’
In the expression: head _
In an equation for ‘head'’: head' = head _
r Relevant bindings include head' :: a (bound at typedhole.hs:3:1)

GHC has rightly suggested that the expression needed to finish the program is xs :: [a] .
The same hole technique can be applied at the toplevel for signatures:

const' :: _
const' x y = x

typedhole.hs:5:11: error:
r Found type wildcard ‘_’ standing for ‘t -> t1 -> t’
Where: ‘t1’ is a rigid type variable bound by
the inferred type of const' :: t -> t1 -> t at typedhole.hs:6:1
‘t’ is a rigid type variable bound by
BASICS 62

the inferred type of const' :: t -> t1 -> t at typedhole.hs:6:1

To use the inferred type, enable PartialTypeSignatures
r In the type signature:
const' :: _
r Relevant bindings include
const' :: t -> t1 -> t (bound at typedhole.hs:6:1)

Pattern wildcards can also be given explicit names so that GHC will use the names when reporting the inferred type in
the resulting message.

foo :: _a -> _a
foo _ = False

typedhole.hs:9:9: error:
r Couldn't match expected type ‘_a’ with actual type ‘Bool’
‘_a’ is a rigid type variable bound by
the type signature for:
foo :: forall _a. _a -> _a
at typedhole.hs:8:8
r In the expression: False
In an equation for ‘foo’: foo _ = False
r Relevant bindings include
foo :: _a -> _a (bound at typedhole.hs:9:1)

The same wildcards can be used in type contexts to dump out inferred type class constraints:

succ' :: _ => a -> a

succ' x = x + 1

typedhole.hs:11:10: error:
Found constraint wildcard ‘_’ standing for ‘Num a’
To use the inferred type, enable PartialTypeSignatures
In the type signature:
succ' :: _ => a -> a

When the flag -XPartialTypeSignatures is passed to GHC and the inferred type is unambiguous, GHC will let us
leave the holes in place and the compilation will proceed with a warning instead of an error.

typedhole.hs:3:10: Warning:
Found hole ‘_’ with type: w_
Where: ‘w_’ is a rigid type variable bound by
the inferred type of succ' :: w_ -> w_1 -> w_ at foo.hs:4:1
In the type signature for ‘succ'’: _ -> _ -> _

Deferred Type Errors

Since the release of version 7.8, GHC supports the option of treating type errors as runtime errors. With this option
enabled, programs will run, but they will fail when a mistyped expression is evaluated. This feature is enabled with the
63 BASICS

-fdefer-type-errors flag in three ways: at the module level, when compiled from the command line, or inside of a
GHCi interactive session.
For instance, the program below will compile:

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -fdefer-type-errors #-} -- Enable deferred type

-- errors at module level

x :: ()
x = print 3

y :: Char
y = 0

z :: Int
z = 0 + "foo"

main :: IO ()
main = do
print x

However, when a pathological term is evaluated at runtime, we’ll see a message like this:

defer: defer.hs:4:5:
Couldn't match expected type ‘()’ with actual type ‘IO ()’
In the expression: print 3
In an equation for ‘x’: x = print 3
(deferred type error)

This error tells us that while x has a declared type of () , the body of the function print 3 has a type of IO () .
However, if the term is never evaluated, GHC will not throw an exception.

Name Conventions
Haskell uses short variable names as a convention. This is offputting at first but after you read enough Haskell, it ceases
to be a problem. In addition there are several ad­hoc conventions that are typically adopted

Variable Convention
a,b,c.. Type level variable
x,y,z.. Value variables
f,g,h.. Higher order function values
x,y List head values
xs,ys List tail values
m Monadic type variable
t Monad transformer variable
e Exception value
s Monad state value
r Monad reader value
t Foldable or Traversable type variable
f Functor or applicative type variable
mX Maybe variable
BASICS 64

Functions that end with a tick (like fold' ) are typically strict variants of a default lazy function.

foldl' :: (b -> a -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

Functions that end with a _ (like map_ ) are typically variants of a function which discards the output and returns void.

mapM_ :: (Foldable t, Monad m) => (a -> m b) -> t a -> m ()

Variables that are pluralized xs , ys typically refer to list tails.

(++) [] ys = ys
(++) (x:xs) ys = x : xs ++ ys

Records that do not export their accessors will sometimes prefix them with underscores. These are sometimes interpreted
by Template Haskell logic to produce derived field accessors.

data Point = Point

{ _x :: Int
, _y :: Int
}

Predicates will often prefix their function names with is , as in isPositive .

isPositive = (>0)

Functions which result in an Applicative or Monad type will often suffix their name with a A for Applicative or M for
Monad. For example:

liftM :: Monad m => (a -> r) -> m a -> m r

liftA :: Applicative f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

Functions which have chirality in which they traverse a data structure (i.e. left­to­right or right­to­left) will often suffix
the name with L or R for their iteration pattern. This is useful because often times these type signatures identical.

mapAccumL :: Traversable t => (a -> b -> (a, c)) -> a -> t b -> (a, t c)
mapAccumR :: Traversable t => (a -> b -> (a, c)) -> a -> t b -> (a, t c)

Functions working with mutable structures or monadic state will often adopt the following naming conventions:

newX -- Create a new mutable X structure

writeX -- Write to an existing mutable X structure
setX -- Set the value of an existing mutable X structure
modifyX -- Apply a function over existing mutable X structure

Functions that are prefixed with with typically take a value as their first argument and a function as their second
argument returning the value with the function applied over some substructure as the result.

withBool :: String -> (Bool -> Parser a) -> Value -> Parser a
65 BASICS

ghcid
ghcid is a lightweight IDE hook that allows continuous feedback whenever code is updated. It can be run from the
command line in the root of the cabal project directory by specifying a command to run (e.g. ghci , cabal repl ,
or stack repl ).

ghcid --command="cabal repl" # Run cabal repl under ghcid

ghcid --command="stack repl" # Run stack repl under ghcid
ghcid --command="ghci baz.hs" # Open baz.hs under ghcid

When a Haskell module is loaded into ghcid , the code is evaluated in order to provide the user with any errors or
warnings that would happen at compile time. When the developer edits and saves code loaded into ghcid , the program
automatically reloads and evaluates the code for errors and warnings.

HLint
HLint is a source linter for Haskell that provides a variety of hints on code improvements. It can be customised and
configured with custom rules, on a per­project basis. HLint is configured through a hlint.yaml file placed in the root
of a project. To generate the default configuration run:

hlint --default > .hlint.yaml

Custom errors can be added to this file in order to match and suggest custom changes of code from the left hand side
match to the right hand side replacement:

error: {lhs: "foo x", rhs: bar x}

HLint’s default is to warn on all possible failures. These can be disabled globally by adding ignore pragmas.

ignore: {name: Use let}

Or within specific modules by specifying the within option.

ignore: {name: Use let, within: MyModule}

See:
• HLint Github

Docker Images
Haskell has stable Docker images that are widely used for deployments across Kubernetes and Docker environments.
The two Dockerhub repositories of note are:
• Official Haskell Images
• Stack LTS Images
To import the official Haskell images with ghc and cabal-install include the following preamble in your Dockerfile
with your desired GHC version.
FROM haskell:8.8.1
BASICS 66

To import the stack images include the following preamble in your Dockerfile with your desired Stack resolver replaced.

FROM fpco/stack-build:lts-14.0

Continuous Integration
These days it is quite common to use cloud hosted continuous integration systems to test code from version control
systems. There are many community contributed build scripts for different service providers, including the following:

• Travis CI for Cabal

• Travis CI for Stack
• Circle CI for Cabal & Stack
• Github Actions for Cabal & Stack

See also the official CI repository:

• haskell­ci

Ormolu
Ormolu is an opinionated Haskell source formatter that produces a canonical way of rendering the Haskell abstract
syntax tree to text. This ensures that code shared amongst teams and checked into version control conforms to a single
universal standard for whitespace and lexeme placing. This is similar to tools in other languages such as go fmt .

For example running ormolu example.hs --inplace on the following module:

module Unformatted
(a,b)
where

a :: Int
a = 42

b :: Int
b = a+ a

Will rerender the file as:

module Unformatted
( a,
b,
)
where

a :: Int
a = 42

b :: Int
b = a + a

Ormolu can be installed via a variety of mechanisms.

67 BASICS

$ stack install ormolu --resolver=lts-14.14 # via stack

$ cabal new-install ormolu --installdir=/home/user/.local/bin # via cabal
$ nix-build -A ormolu # via nix

See:

• ormolu

Haddock
Haddock is the automatic documentation generation tool for Haskell source code, and it integrates with the usual
cabal toolchain. In this section, we will explore how to document code so that Haddock can generate documentation
successfully.

Several frequent comment patterns are used to document code for Haddock. The first of these methods uses -- | to
delineate the beginning of a comment:

-- | Documentation for f
f :: a -> a
f = ...

Multiline comments are also possible:

-- | Multiline documentation for the function

-- f with multiple arguments.
fmap :: Functor f
=> (a -> b) -- ^ function
-> f a -- ^ input
-> f b -- ^ output

-- ^ is used to comment Constructors or Record fields:

data T a b
= A a -- ^ Documentation for A
| B b -- ^ Documentation for B

data R a b = R
{ f1 :: a -- ^ Documentation for the field f1
, f2 :: b -- ^ Documentation for the field f2
}

Elements within a module (i.e. values, types, classes) can be hyperlinked by enclosing the identifier in single quotes:

data T a b
= A a -- ^ Documentation for 'A'
| B b -- ^ Documentation for 'B'

Modules themselves can be referenced by enclosing them in double quotes:

BASICS 68

-- | Here we use the "Data.Text" library and import

-- the 'Data.Text.pack' function.

haddock also allows the user to include blocks of code within the generated documentation. Two methods of de­
marcating the code blocks exist in haddock . For example, enclosing a code snippet in @ symbols marks it as a code
block:

-- | An example of a code block.

--
-- @
-- f x = f (f x)
-- @

Similarly, it is possible to use bird tracks ( > ) in a comment line to set off a code block.

-- | A similar code block example that uses bird tracks (i.e. '>')
-- > f x = f (f x)

Snippets of interactive shell sessions can also be included in haddock documentation. In order to denote the beginning
of code intended to be run in a REPL, the >>> symbol is used:

-- | Example of an interactive shell session embedded within documentation

--
-- >>> factorial 5
-- 120

Headers for specific blocks can be added by prefacing the comment in the module block with a * :

module Foo (
-- * My Header
example1,
example2
)

Sections can also be delineated by $ blocks that pertain to references in the body of the module:

module Foo (
-- $section1
example1,
example2
)

-- $section1
-- Here is the documentation section that describes the symbols
-- 'example1' and 'example2'.

Links can be added with the following syntax:

69 BASICS

<url text>

Images can also be included, so long as the path is either absolute or relative to the directory in which haddock is run.

<<diagram.png title>>

haddock options can also be specified with pragmas in the source, either at the module or project level.

{-# OPTIONS_HADDOCK show-extensions, ignore-exports #-}

Option Description
ignore­exports Ignores the export list and includes all signatures in scope.
not­home Module will not be considered in the root documentation.
show­extensions Annotates the documentation with the language extensions used.
hide Forces the module to be hidden from Haddock.
prune Omits definitions with no annotations.

Unsafe Functions
As everyone eventually finds out there are several functions within the implementation of GHC (not the Haskell language)
that can be used to subvert the type­system; these functions are marked with the prefix unsafe . Unsafe functions exist
only for when one can manually prove the soundness of an expression but can’t express this property in the type­system,
or externalities to Haskell.

unsafeCoerce :: a -> b -- Unsafely coerce anything into anything

unsafePerformIO :: IO a -> a -- Unsafely run IO action outside of IO

Using these functions to subvert the Haskell typesystem will cause all measure of undefined behavior with unimaginable
pain and suffering, and so they are strongly discouraged. When initially starting out with Haskell there are no legitimate
reasons to use these functions at all.
BASICS 70
Chapter 2

Monads

Monads form one of the core components for constructing Haskell programs. In their most general form monads are an
algebraic building block that can give rise to ways of structuring control flow, handling data structures and orchestrating
logic. Monads are a very general algebraic way of structuring code and have a certain reputation for being confusing.
However their power and flexibility have become foundational to the way modern Haskell programs are structured.
There is a singular truth to keep in mind when learning monads.
A monad is just its algebraic laws. Nothing more, nothing less.

Eightfold Path to Monad Satori

Much ink has been spilled waxing lyrical about the supposed mystique of monads. Instead, I suggest a path to enlight­
enment:
1. Don’t read the monad tutorials.
2. No really, don’t read the monad tutorials.
3. Learn about the Haskell typesystem.
4. Learn what a typeclass is.
5. Read the Typeclassopedia.
6. Read the monad definitions.
7. Use monads in real code.
8. Don’t write monad­analogy tutorials.
In other words, the only path to understanding monads is to read the fine source, fire up GHC, and write some code.
Analogies and metaphors will not lead to understanding.

Monad Myths
The following are all false:
• Monads are impure.
• Monads are about effects.
• Monads are about state.
• Monads are about imperative sequencing.
• Monads are about IO.
• Monads are dependent on laziness.
• Monads are a “back­door” in the language to perform side­effects.
• Monads are an embedded imperative language inside Haskell.
• Monads require knowing abstract mathematics.

71
MONADS 72

• Monads are unique to Haskell.

Monad Methods
Monads are not complicated. They are implemented as a typeclass with two methods, return and (>>=) (pronounced
“bind”). In order to implement a Monad instance, these two functions must be defined:

class Monad m where

return :: a -> m a -- N.B. 'm' refers to a type constructor
-- (e.g., Maybe, Either, etc.) that
-- implements the Monad typeclass

(>>=) :: m a -> (a -> m b) -> m b

The first type signature in the Monad class definition is for return . Any preconceptions one might have for the word
“return” should be discarded. It has an entirely different meaning in the context of Haskell and acts very differently than
in languages such as C, Python, or Java. Instead of being the final arbiter of what value a function produces, return
in Haskell injects a value of type a into a monadic context (e.g., Maybe, Either, etc.), which is denoted as m a .
The other function essential to implementing a Monad instance is (>>=) . This infix function takes two arguments. On
its left side is a value with type m a , while on the right side is a function with type (a -> m b) . The bind operation
results in a final value of type m b .
A third, auxiliary function ( (>>) ) is defined in terms of the bind operation that discards its argument.

(>>) :: Monad m => m a -> m b -> m b

m >> k = m >>= \_ -> k

This definition says that (>>) has a left and right argument which are monadic with types m a and m b respectively,
while the infix function yields a value of type m b . The actual implementation of (>>) says that when m is passed to
(>>) with k on the right, the value k will always be yielded.

Monad Laws
In addition to specific implementations of (>>=) and return , all monad instances must satisfy three laws.
Law 1
The first law says that when return a is passed through (>>=) into a function f , this expression is exactly equivalent
to f a .

return a >>= f ≡ f a -- N.B. 'a' refers to a value, not a type

In discussing the next two laws, we’ll refer to a value m . This notation is shorthand for a value wrapped in a monadic
context. Such a value has type m a , and could be represented more concretely by values like Nothing , Just x , or
Right x . It is important to note that some of these concrete instantiations of the value m have multiple components.
In discussing the second and third monad laws, we’ll see some examples of how this plays out.
Law 2
The second law states that a monadic value m passed through (>>=) into return is exactly equivalent to itself. In
other words, using bind to pass a monadic value to return does not change the initial value.
73 MONADS

m >>= return ≡ m -- 'm' here refers to a value that has type 'm a'

A more explicit way to write the second Monad law exists. In this following example code, the first expression shows
how the second law applies to values represented by non­nullary type constructors. The second snippet shows how a
value represented by a nullary type constructor works within the context of the second law.

(SomeMonad val) >>= return ≡ SomeMonad val -- 'SomeMonad val' has type 'm a' just
-- like 'm' from the first example of the
-- second law

NullaryMonadType >>= return ≡ NullaryMonadType

Law 3

While the first two laws are relatively clear, the third law may be more difficult to understand. This law states that when
a monadic value m is passed through (>>=) to the function f and then the result of that expression is passed to
>>= g , the entire expression is exactly equivalent to passing m to a lambda expression that takes one parameter x and
outputs the function f applied to x . By the definition of bind, f x must return a value wrapped in the same monad.
Because of this property, the resultant value of that expression can be passed through (>>=) to the function g , which
also returns a monadic value.

(m >>= f) >>= g ≡ m >>= (\x -> f x >>= g) -- Like in the last law, 'm' has
-- has type 'm a'. The functions 'f'
-- and 'g' have types '(a -> m b)'
-- and '(b -> m c)' respectively

Again, it is possible to write this law with more explicit code. Like in the explicit examples for law 2, m has been
replaced by SomeMonad val in order to be make it clear that there can be multiple components to a monadic value.
Although little has changed in the code, it is easier to see that value –namely, val – corresponds to the x in the lambda
expression. After SomeMonad val is passed through (>>=) to f , the function f operates on val and returns a
result still wrapped in the SomeMonad type constructor. We can call this new value SomeMonad newVal . Since it is still
wrapped in the monadic context, SomeMonad newVal can thus be passed through the bind operation into the function
g.

((SomeMonad val) >>= f) >>= g ≡ (SomeMonad val) >>= (\x -> f x >>= g)

Monad law summary: Law 1 and 2 are identity laws (left and right identity respectively) and law 3 is the associativity
law. Together they ensure that Monads can be composed and ‘do the right thing’.

See:

• Monad Laws

Do Notation
Monadic syntax in Haskell is written in a sugared form, known as do notation. The advantages of this special syntax
are that it is easier to write and often easier to read, and it is entirely equivalent to simply applying the monad operations.
The desugaring is defined recursively by the rules:
MONADS 74

do { a <- f ; m } ≡ f >>= \a -> do { m } -- bind 'f' to a, proceed to desugar

-- 'm'

do { f ; m } ≡ f >> do { m } -- evaluate 'f', then proceed to

-- desugar m

do { m } ≡ m

Thus, through the application of the desugaring rules, the following expressions are equivalent:

do
a <- f -- f, g, and h are bound to the names a,
b <- g -- b, and c. These names are then passed
c <- h -- to 'return' to ensure that all values
return (a, b, c) -- are wrapped in the appropriate monadic
-- context

do { -- N.B. '{}' and ';' characters are

a <- f; -- rarely used in do-notation
b <- g;
c <- h;
return (a, b, c)
}

f >>= \a ->
g >>= \b ->
h >>= \c ->
return (a, b, c)

If one were to write the bind operator as an uncurried function (which is not how Haskell uses it) the same desugaring
might look something like the following chain of nested binds with lambdas.

bindMonad(f, lambda a:
bindMonad(g, lambda b:
bindMonad(h, lambda c:
returnMonad (a,b,c))))

In the do­notation, the monad laws from above are equivalently written:

Law 1

do y <- return x
f y

= do f x

Law 2

do x <- m
return x
75 MONADS

= do m

Law 3

do b <- do a <- m
f a
g b

= do a <- m
b <- f a
g b

= do a <- m
do b <- f a
g b

See:
• Haskell 2010: Do Expressions

Maybe Monad
The Maybe monad is the simplest first example of a monad instance. The Maybe monad models a computation which
may fail to yield a value at any point during computation.
The Maybe type has two value constructors. The first, Just , is a unary constructor representing a successful computa­
tion, while the second, Nothing , is a nullary constructor that represents failure.

data Maybe a = Nothing | Just a

The monad instance describes the implementation of (>>=) for Maybe by pattern matching on the possible inputs
that could be passed to the bind operation (i.e., Nothing or Just x ). The instance declaration also provides an
implementation of return , which in this case is simply Just .

instance Monad Maybe where

(Just x) >>= k = k x -- 'k' is a function with type (a -> Maybe a)
Nothing >>= k = Nothing

return = Just -- Just's type signature is (a -> Maybe a), in

-- other words, extremely similar to the
-- type of 'return' in the typeclass
-- declaration above.

The following code shows some simple operations to do within the Maybe monad.

(Just 3) >>= (\x -> return (x + 1))

-- Just 4

In the above example, the value Just 3 is passed via (>>=) to the lambda function \x -> return (x + 1) . x
refers to the Int portion of Just 3 , and we can use x in the second half of the lambda expression, return (x + 1)
MONADS 76

which evaluates to Just 4 , indicating a successful computation.

In the second example, the value Nothing is passed via (>>=) to the same lambda function as in the previous example.
However, according to the Maybe Monad instance, whenever Nothing is bound to a function, the expression’s result
will be Nothing .

Nothing >>= (\x -> return (x + 1))

-- Nothing

Here, return is applied to 4 and results in Just 4 .

return 4 :: Maybe Int

-- Just 4

The next code examples show the use of do notation within the Maybe monad to do addition that might fail. Desugared
examples are provided as well.

example1 :: Maybe Int

example1 = do
a <- Just 3 -- Bind 3 to name a
b <- Just 4 -- Bind 4 to name b
return $ a + b -- Evaluate (a + b), then use 'return' to ensure
-- the result is in the Maybe monad in order to
-- satisfy the type signature
-- Just 7

desugared1 :: Maybe Int

desugared1 = Just 3 >>= \a -> -- This example is the desugared
Just 4 >>= \b -> -- equivalent to example1
return $ a + b

-- Just 7

example2 :: Maybe Int

example2 = do
a <- Just 3 -- Bind 3 to name a
b <- Nothing -- Bind Nothing to name b
return $ a + b

-- Nothing

-- This result might be somewhat surprising, since

-- addition within the Maybe monad can actually
-- return 'Nothing'. This result occurs because one
-- of the values, Nothing, indicates computational
-- failure. Since the computation failed at one
-- step within the process, the whole computation
-- fails, leaving us with 'Nothing' as the final
-- result.

desugared2 :: Maybe Int

desugared2 = Just 3 >>= \a -> -- This example is the desugared
77 MONADS

Nothing >>= \b -> -- equivalent to example2

return $ a + b
-- Nothing

List Monad
The List monad is the second simplest example of a monad instance. As always, this monad implements both (>>=)
and return .

instance Monad [] where

m >>= f = concat (map f m) -- 'm' is a list
return x = [x]

The definition of bind says that when the list m is bound to a function f , the result is a concatenation of map f over
the list m . The return method simply takes a single value x and injects into a singleton list [x] .

In order to demonstrate the List monad’s methods, we will define two values: m and f . m is a simple list, while
f is a function that takes a single Int and returns a two element list [1, 0] .

m :: [Int]
m = [1,2,3,4]

f :: Int -> [Int]

f = \x -> [1,0] -- 'f' always returns [1, 0]

When applied to bind, evaluation proceeds as follows:

m >>= f
==> [1,2,3,4] >>= \x -> [1,0]
==> concat (map (\x -> [1,0]) [1,2,3,4])
==> concat ([[1,0],[1,0],[1,0],[1,0]])
==> [1,0,1,0,1,0,1,0]

The list comprehension syntax in Haskell can be implemented in terms of the list monad. List comprehensions can be
considered syntactic sugar for more obviously monadic implementations. Examples a and b illustrate these use cases.
The first example ( a ) illustrates how to write a list comprehension. Although the syntax looks strange at first, there
are elements of it that may look familiar. For instance, the use of <- is just like bind in a do notation: It binds an
element of a list to a name. However, one major difference is apparent: a seems to lack a call to return . Not to
worry, though, the [] fills this role. This syntax can be easily desugared by the compiler to an explicit invocation of
return . Furthermore, it serves to remind the user that the computation takes place in the List monad.

a = [
f x y | -- Corresponds to 'f x y' in example b
x <- xs,
y <- ys,
x == y -- Corresponds to 'guard $ x == y' in example b
]

The second example ( b ) shows the list comprehension above rewritten with do notation:
MONADS 78

-- Identical to `a`
b = do
x <- xs
y <- ys
guard $ x == y -- Corresponds to 'x == y' in example a
return $ f x y -- Corresponds to the '[]' and 'f x y' in example a

The final examples are further illustrations of the List monad. The functions below each return a list of 3­tuples which
contain the possible combinations of the three lists that get bound the names a , b , and c . N.B.: Only values in the
list bound to a can be used in a position of the tuple; the same fact holds true for the lists bound to b and c .

example :: [(Int, Int, Int)]

example = do
a <- [1,2]
b <- [10,20]
c <- [100,200]
return (a,b,c)
-- [(1,10,100),(1,10,200),(1,20,100),(1,20,200),(2,10,100),(2,10,200),(2,20,100),(2,20,200)]

desugared :: [(Int, Int, Int)]

desugared = [1, 2] >>= \a ->
[10, 20] >>= \b ->
[100, 200] >>= \c ->
return (a, b, c)
-- [(1,10,100),(1,10,200),(1,20,100),(1,20,200),(2,10,100),(2,10,200),(2,20,100),(2,20,200)]

IO Monad
Perhaps the most (in)famous example in Haskell of a type that forms a monad is IO . A value of type IO a is a
computation which, when performed, does some I/O before returning a value of type a . These computations are called
actions. IO actions executed in main are the means by which a program can operate on or access information from the
external world. IO actions allow the program to do many things, including, but not limited to:
• Print a String to the terminal
• Read and parse input from the terminal
• Read from or write to a file on the system
• Establish an ssh connection to a remote computer
• Take input from a radio antenna for signal processing
• Launch the missiles.
Conceptualizing I/O as a monad enables the developer to access information from outside the program, but also to use
pure functions to operate on that information as data. The following examples will show how we can use IO actions and
IO values to receive input from stdin and print to stdout.

Perhaps the most immediately useful function for doing I/O in Haskell is putStrLn . This function takes a String
and returns an IO () . Calling it from main will result in the String being printed to stdout followed by a newline
character.

putStrLn :: String -> IO ()

Here is some code that prints a couple of lines to the terminal. The first invocation of putStrLn is executed, causing
79 MONADS

the String to be printed to stdout. The result is bound to a lambda expression that discards its argument, and then
the next putStrLn is executed.

main :: IO ()
main = putStrLn "Vesihiisi sihisi hississäään." >>=
\_ -> putStrLn "Or in English: 'The water devil was hissing in her elevator'."

-- Sugared code, written with do notation

main :: IO ()
main = do putStrLn "Vesihiisi sihisi hississäään."
putStrLn "Or in English: 'The water devil was hissing in her elevator'."

Another useful function is getLine which has type IO String . This function gets a line of input from stdin. The
developer can then bind this line to a name in order to operate on the value within the program.

getLine :: IO String

The code below demonstrates a simple combination of these two functions as well as desugaring IO code. First,
putStrLn prints a String to stdout to ask the user to supply their name, with the result being bound to a lambda
that discards it argument. Then, getLine is executed, supplying a prompt to the user for entering their name. Next,
the resultant IO String is bound to name and passed to putStrLn . Finally, the program prints the name to the
terminal.

main :: IO ()
main = do putStrLn "What is your name: "
name <- getLine
putStrLn name

The next code block is the desugared equivalent of the previous example where the uses of (>>=) are made explicit.

main :: IO ()
main = putStrLn "What is your name:" >>=
\_ -> getLine >>=
\name -> putStrLn name

Our final example executes in the same way as the previous two examples. This example, though, uses the special (>>)
operator to take the place of binding a result to the lambda that discards its argument.

main :: IO ()
main = putStrLn "What is your name: " >> (getLine >>= (\name -> putStrLn name))

See:

• Haskell 2010: Basic/Input Output

What’s the point?

Although it is difficult, if not impossible, to touch, see, or otherwise physically interact with a monad, this construct
has some very interesting implications for programmers. For instance, consider the non­intuitive fact that we now have
MONADS 80

a uniform interface for talking about three very different, but foundational ideas for programming: Failure, Collections
and Effects.

Let’s write down a new function called sequence which folds a function mcons over a list of monadic computations.
We can think of mcons as analogous to the list constructor (i.e. (a : b : []) ) except it pulls the two list elements
out of two monadic values ( p , q ) by means of bind. The bound values are then joined with the list constructor : ,
before finally being rewrapped in the appropriate monadic context with return .

sequence :: Monad m => [m a] -> m [a]

sequence = foldr mcons (return [])

mcons :: Monad m => m t -> m [t] -> m [t]

mcons p q = do
x <- p -- 'x' refers to a singleton value
y <- q -- 'y' refers to a list. Because of this fact, 'x' can be
return (x:y) -- prepended to it

What does this function mean in terms of each of the monads discussed above?

Maybe

For the Maybe monad, sequencing a list of values within the Maybe context allows us to collect the results of a series
of computations which can possibly fail. However, sequence yields the aggregated values only if each computation
succeeds. In other words, if even one of the Maybe values in the initial list passed to sequence is a Nothing , the
result of evaluating sequence for the whole list will also be Nothing .

sequence :: [Maybe a] -> Maybe [a]

sequence [Just 3, Just 4]

-- Just [3,4]

sequence [Just 3, Just 4, Nothing] -- Since one of the results is Nothing,

-- Nothing -- the whole computation fails

List

The bind operation for the list monad forms the pairwise list of elements from the two operands. Thus, folding the
binds contained in mcons over a list of lists with sequence implements the general Cartesian product for an arbitrary
number of lists.

sequence :: [[a]] -> [[a]]

sequence [[1,2,3],[10,20,30]]
-- [[1,10],[1,20],[1,30],[2,10],[2,20],[2,30],[3,10],[3,20],[3,30]]

IO

Applying sequence within the IO context results in still a different result. The function takes a list of IO actions,
performs them sequentially, and then gives back the list of resulting values in the order sequenced.
81 MONADS

sequence :: [IO a] -> IO [a]

sequence [getLine, getLine, getLine]

-- a -- a, b, and 9 are the inputs given by the
-- b -- user at the prompt
-- 9
-- ["a", "b", "9"] -- All inputs are returned in a list as
-- an IO [String].

So there we have it, three fundamental concepts of computation that are normally defined independently of each other
actually all share this similar structure. This unifying pattern can be abstracted out and reused to build higher abstractions
that work for all current and future implementations. If you want a motivating reason for understanding monads, this
is it! These insights are the essence of what I wish I knew about monads looking back.

See:

• Control.Monad

Reader Monad
The reader monad lets us access shared immutable state within a monadic context.

ask :: Reader r r
asks :: (r -> a) -> Reader r a
local :: (r -> r) -> Reader r a -> Reader r a
runReader :: Reader r a -> r -> a

import Control.Monad.Reader

data MyContext = MyContext

{ foo :: String
, bar :: Int
} deriving (Show)

computation :: Reader MyContext (Maybe String)

computation = do
n <- asks bar
x <- asks foo
if n > 0
then return (Just x)
else return Nothing

ex1 :: Maybe String

ex1 = runReader computation $ MyContext "hello" 1

ex2 :: Maybe String

ex2 = runReader computation $ MyContext "haskell" 0

A simple implementation of the Reader monad:

MONADS 82

newtype Reader r a = Reader { runReader :: r -> a }

instance Monad (Reader r) where

return a = Reader $ \_ -> a
m >>= k = Reader $ \r -> runReader (k (runReader m r)) r

ask :: Reader a a
ask = Reader id

asks :: (r -> a) -> Reader r a

asks f = Reader f

local :: (r -> r) -> Reader r a -> Reader r a

local f m = Reader $ runReader m . f

Writer Monad
The writer monad lets us emit a lazy stream of values from within a monadic context.

tell :: w -> Writer w ()

execWriter :: Writer w a -> w
runWriter :: Writer w a -> (a, w)

import Control.Monad.Writer

type MyWriter = Writer [Int] String

example :: MyWriter
example = do
tell [1..3]
tell [3..5]
return "foo"

output :: (String, [Int])

output = runWriter example
-- ("foo", [1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5])

A simple implementation of the Writer monad:

import Data.Monoid

newtype Writer w a = Writer { runWriter :: (a, w) }

instance Monoid w => Monad (Writer w) where

return a = Writer (a, mempty)
m >>= k = Writer $ let
(a, w) = runWriter m
(b, w') = runWriter (k a)
in (b, w `mappend` w')
83 MONADS

execWriter :: Writer w a -> w

execWriter m = snd (runWriter m)

tell :: w -> Writer w ()

tell w = Writer ((), w)

This implementation is lazy, so some care must be taken that one actually wants to only generate a stream of thunks. Most
often the lazy writer is not suitable for use, instead implement the equivalent structure by embedding some monomial
object inside a StateT monad, or using the strict version.

import Control.Monad.Writer.Strict

State Monad
The state monad allows functions within a stateful monadic context to access and modify shared state.

runState :: State s a -> s -> (a, s)

evalState :: State s a -> s -> a
execState :: State s a -> s -> s

import Control.Monad.State

test :: State Int Int

test = do
put 3
modify (+1)
get

main :: IO ()
main = print $ execState test 0

The state monad is often mistakenly described as being impure, but it is in fact entirely pure and the same effect could
be achieved by explicitly passing state. A simple implementation of the State monad takes only a few lines:

newtype State s a = State { runState :: s -> (a,s) }

instance Monad (State s) where

return a = State $ \s -> (a, s)

State act >>= k = State $ \s ->

let (a, s') = act s
in runState (k a) s'

get :: State s s
get = State $ \s -> (s, s)

put :: s -> State s ()

put s = State $ \_ -> ((), s)
MONADS 84

modify :: (s -> s) -> State s ()

modify f = get >>= \x -> put (f x)

evalState :: State s a -> s -> a

evalState act = fst . runState act

execState :: State s a -> s -> s

execState act = snd . runState act

Why are monads confusing?

So many monad tutorials have been written that it begs the question: what makes monads so difficult when first learning
Haskell? I hypothesize there are three aspects to why this is so:
1. There are several levels of indirection with desugaring.
A lot of the Haskell we write is radically rearranged and transformed into an entirely new form under the hood.
Most monad tutorials will not manually expand out the do­sugar. This leaves the beginner thinking that monads are a
way of dropping into a pseudo­imperative language inside of pure code and further fuels the misconception that specific
instances like IO describe monads in their full generality. When in fact the IO monad is only one among many instances.

main = do
x <- getLine
putStrLn x
return ()

Being able to manually desugar is crucial to understanding.

main =
getLine >>= \x ->
putStrLn x >>= \_ ->
return ()

2. Infix operators for higher order functions are not common in other languages.

(>>=) :: Monad m => m a -> (a -> m b) -> m b

On the left hand side of the operator we have an m a and on the right we have a -> m b . Thus, this operator is
asymmetric, utilizing a monadic value on the left and a higher order function on the right. Although some languages do
have infix operators that are themselves higher order functions, it is still a rather rare occurrence.
Thus, with a function desugared, it can be confusing that (>>=) operator is in fact building up a much larger function
by composing functions together.

main =
getLine >>= \x ->
putStrLn x >>= \_ ->
return ()

Written in prefix form, it becomes a little bit more digestible.

85 MONADS

main =
(>>=) getLine (\x ->
(>>=) (putStrLn x) (\_ ->
return ()
)
)

Perhaps even removing the operator entirely might be more intuitive coming from other languages.

main = bind getLine (\x -> bind (putStrLn x) (\_ -> return ()))
where
bind x y = x >>= y

3. Ad­hoc polymorphism is not commonplace in other languages.

Haskell’s implementation of overloading can be unintuitive if one is not familiar with type inference. Indeed, newcomers
to Haskell often believe they can gain an intuition for monads in a way that will unify their understanding of all monads.
This is a fallacy, however, because any particular monad instance is merely an instantiation of the monad typeclass
functions implemented for that particular type.
This is all abstracted away from the user, but the (>>=) or bind function is really a function of 3 arguments with the
extra typeclass dictionary argument ( $dMonad ) implicitly threaded around.

main $dMonad = bind $dMonad getLine (\x -> bind $dMonad (putStrLn x) (\_ -> return $dMonad ()))

In general, this is true for all typeclasses in Haskell and it’s true here as well, except in the case where the parameter of
the monad class is unified (through inference) with a concrete class instance.
Now, all of these transformations are trivial once we understand them, they’re just typically not discussed. In my opin­
ion the fundamental fallacy of monad tutorials is not that intuition for monads is hard to convey (nor are metaphors
required!), but that novices often come to monads with an incomplete understanding of points (1), (2), and (3) and then
trip on the simple fact that monads are the first example of a Haskell construct that is the confluence of all three.
Thus we make monads more difficult than they need to be. At the end of the day they are simple algebraic critters.
MONADS 86
Chapter 3

Monad Transformers

mtl / transformers
The descriptions of Monads in the previous chapter are a bit of a white lie. Modern Haskell monad libraries typically
use a more general form of these, written in terms of monad transformers which allow us to compose monads together
to form composite monads.
Imagine if you had an application that wanted to deal with a Maybe monad wrapped inside a State Monad, all wrapped
inside the IO monad. This is the problem that monad transformers solve, a problem of composing different monads. At
their core, monad transformers allow us to nest monadic computations in a stack with an interface to exchange values
between the levels, called lift:

lift :: (Monad m, MonadTrans t) => m a -> t m a

In production code, the monads mentioned previously may actually be their more general transformer form composed
with the Identity monad.

type State s = StateT s Identity

type Writer w = WriterT w Identity
type Reader r = ReaderT r Identity

The following table shows the relationships between these forms:

Monad Transformer Type Transformed Type

Maybe MaybeT Maybe a m (Maybe a)
Reader ReaderT r -> a r -> m a
Writer WriterT (a,w) m (a,w)
State StateT s -> (a,s) s -> m (a,s)

Just as the base monad class has laws, monad transformers also have several laws:
Law #1

lift . return = return

Law #2

87
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 88

lift (m >>= f) = lift m >>= (lift . f)

Or equivalently:
Law #1

lift (return x)

= return x

Law #2

do x <- lift m
lift (f x)

= lift $ do x <- m
f x

It’s useful to remember that transformers compose outside­in but are unrolled inside out.

Transformers
The lift definition provided above comes from the transformers library along with an IO­specialized form called
liftIO :

lift :: (Monad m, MonadTrans t) => m a -> t m a

liftIO :: MonadIO m => IO a -> m a

These definitions rely on the following typeclass definitions, which describe composing one monad with another monad
(the “t” is the transformed second monad):

class MonadTrans t where

lift :: Monad m => m a -> t m a

class (Monad m) => MonadIO m where

liftIO :: IO a -> m a

instance MonadIO IO where

liftIO = id

Basics
The most basic use requires us to use the T­variants for each of the monad transformers in the outer layers and to
explicitly lift and return values between the layers. Monads have kind (* -> *) , so monad transformers which
take monads to monads have ((* -> *) -> * -> *) :

Monad (m :: * -> *)
MonadTrans (t :: (* -> *) -> * -> *)
89 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

For example, if we wanted to form a composite computation using both the Reader and Maybe monads, using
MonadTrans we could use Maybe inside of a ReaderT to form ReaderT t Maybe a .

import Control.Monad.Reader

type Env = [(String, Int)]

type Eval a = ReaderT Env Maybe a

data Expr
= Val Int
| Add Expr Expr
| Var String
deriving (Show)

eval :: Expr -> Eval Int

eval ex = case ex of

Val n -> return n

Add x y -> do
a <- eval x
b <- eval y
return (a+b)

Var x -> do
env <- ask
val <- lift (lookup x env)
return val

env :: Env
env = [("x", 2), ("y", 5)]

ex1 :: Eval Int

ex1 = eval (Add (Val 2) (Add (Val 1) (Var "x")))

example1, example2 :: Maybe Int

example1 = runReaderT ex1 env
example2 = runReaderT ex1 []

The fundamental limitation of this approach is that we find ourselves lift.lift.lift ing and return.return.return ing
a lot.

mtl
The mtl library is the most commonly used interface for these monad tranformers, but mtl depends on the transform­
ers library from which it generalizes the “basic” monads described above into more general transformers, such as the
following:

instance Monad m => MonadState s (StateT s m)

instance Monad m => MonadReader r (ReaderT r m)
instance (Monoid w, Monad m) => MonadWriter w (WriterT w m)
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 90

This solves the “lift.lift.lifting” problem introduced by transformers.

ReaderT
By way of an example there exist three possible forms of the Reader monad. The first is the primitive version which no
longer exists, but which is useful for understanding the underlying ideas. The other two are the transformers and mtl
variants.
Reader

newtype Reader r a = Reader { runReader :: r -> a }

instance MonadReader r (Reader r) where

ask = Reader id
local f m = Reader (runReader m . f)

ReaderT

newtype ReaderT r m a = ReaderT { runReaderT :: r -> m a }

instance (Monad m) => Monad (ReaderT r m) where

return a = ReaderT $ \_ -> return a
m >>= k = ReaderT $ \r -> do
a <- runReaderT m r
runReaderT (k a) r

instance MonadTrans (ReaderT r) where

lift m = ReaderT $ \_ -> m

MonadReader

class (Monad m) => MonadReader r m | m -> r where

ask :: m r
local :: (r -> r) -> m a -> m a

instance (Monad m) => MonadReader r (ReaderT r m) where

ask = ReaderT return
local f m = ReaderT $ \r -> runReaderT m (f r)

So, hypothetically the three variants of ask would be:

ask :: Reader r r
ask :: Monad m => ReaderT r m r
ask :: MonadReader r m => m r

In practice the mtl variant is the one commonly used in Modern Haskell.

Newtype Deriving
Newtype deriving is a common technique used in combination with the mtl library and as such we will discuss its use
for transformers in this section.
91 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

As discussed in the newtypes section, newtypes let us reference a data type with a single constructor as a new distinct
type, with no runtime overhead from boxing, unlike an algebraic datatype with a single constructor. Newtype wrappers
around strings and numeric types can often drastically reduce accidental errors.
Consider the case of using a newtype to distinguish between two different text blobs with different semantics. Both have
the same runtime representation as a text object, but are distinguished statically, so that plaintext can not be accidentally
interchanged with encrypted text.

newtype Plaintext = Plaintext Text

newtype Crytpotext = Cryptotext Text

encrypt :: Key -> Plaintext -> Cryptotext

decrypt :: Key -> Cryptotext -> Plaintext

This is a surprisingly powerful tool as the Haskell compiler will refuse to compile any function which treats Cryptotext
as Plaintext or vice versa!
The other common use case is using newtypes to derive logic for deriving custom monad transformers in our business
logic. Using -XGeneralizedNewtypeDeriving we can recover the functionality of instances of the underlying types
composed in our transformer stack.

{-# LANGUAGE GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving #-}

newtype Quantity v a = Quantity a

deriving (Eq, Ord, Num, Show)

data Haskeller
type Haskellers = Quantity Haskeller Int

a = Quantity 2 :: Haskellers
b = Quantity 6 :: Haskellers

totalHaskellers :: Haskellers
totalHaskellers = a + b

newtype Velocity = Velocity { unVelocity :: Double }

deriving (Eq, Ord)

v :: Velocity
v = Velocity 2.718

x :: Double
x = 2.718

-- Type error is caught at compile time even though

-- they are the same value at runtime!
err = v + x

Couldn't match type `Double' with `Velocity'

Expected type: Velocity
Actual type: Double
In the second argument of `(+)', namely `x'
In the expression: v + x
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 92

Using newtype deriving with the mtl library typeclasses we can produce flattened transformer types that don’t require
explicit lifting in the transform stack. For example, here is a little stack machine involving the Reader, Writer and State
monads.

{-# LANGUAGE GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving #-}

import Control.Monad.Reader
import Control.Monad.Writer
import Control.Monad.State

type Stack = [Int]

type Output = [Int]
type Program = [Instr]

type VM a = ReaderT Program (WriterT Output (State Stack)) a

newtype Comp a = Comp { unComp :: VM a }

deriving (Functor, Applicative, Monad, MonadReader Program, MonadWriter Output, MonadState Stack)

data Instr = Push Int | Pop | Puts

evalInstr :: Instr -> Comp ()

evalInstr instr = case instr of
Pop -> modify tail
Push n -> modify (n:)
Puts -> do
tos <- gets head
tell [tos]

eval :: Comp ()
eval = do
instr <- ask
case instr of
[] -> return ()
(i:is) -> evalInstr i >> local (const is) eval

execVM :: Program -> Output

execVM = flip evalState [] . execWriterT . runReaderT (unComp eval)

program :: Program
program = [
Push 42,
Push 27,
Puts,
Pop,
Puts,
Pop
]

main :: IO ()
main = mapM_ print $ execVM program

Pattern matching on a newtype constructor compiles into nothing. For example the extractB function below does not
scrutinize the MkB constructor like extractA does, because MkB does not exist at runtime; it is purely a compile­time
93 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

construct.

data A = MkA Int

newtype B = MkB Int

extractA :: A -> Int

extractA (MkA x) = x

extractB :: B -> Int

extractB (MkB x) = x

Efficiency
The second monad transformer law guarantees that sequencing consecutive lift operations is semantically equivalent to
lifting the results into the outer monad.

do x <- lift m == lift $ do x <- m

lift (f x) f x

Although they are guaranteed to yield the same result, the operation of lifting the results between the monad levels is
not without cost and crops up frequently when working with the monad traversal and looping functions. For example,
all three of the functions on the left below are less efficient than the right hand side which performs the bind in the base
monad instead of lifting on each iteration.

-- Less Efficient More Efficient

forever (lift m) == lift (forever m)
mapM_ (lift . f) xs == lift (mapM_ f xs)
forM_ xs (lift . f) == lift (forM_ xs f)

Monad Morphisms
Although the base monad transformer package provides a MonadTrans class for lifting to another monad:

lift :: Monad m => m a -> t m a

But oftentimes we need to work with and manipulate our monad transformer stack to either produce new transformers,
modify existing ones or extend an upstream library with new layers. The mmorph library provides the capacity to compose
monad morphism transformation directly on transformer stacks. This is achieved primarily by use of the hoist function
which maps a function from a base monad into a function over a transformed monad.

hoist :: Monad m => (forall a. m a -> n a) -> t m b -> t n b

Hoist takes a monad morphism (a mapping from a m a to a n a ) and applies in on the inner value monad of a
transformer stack, transforming the value under the outer layer.

The monad morphism generalize takes an Identity monad into any another monad m .
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 94

generalize :: Monad m => Identity a -> m a

For example, it generalizes State s a (which is StateT s Identity a ) to StateT s m a .

So we can generalize an existing transformer to lift an IO layer onto it.

import Control.Monad.State
import Control.Monad.Morph

type Eval a = State [Int] a

runEval :: [Int] -> Eval a -> a

runEval = flip evalState

pop :: Eval Int

pop = do
top <- gets head
modify tail
return top

push :: Int -> Eval ()

push x = modify (x:)

ev1 :: Eval Int

ev1 = do
push 3
push 4
pop
pop

ev2 :: StateT [Int] IO ()

ev2 = do
result <- hoist generalize ev1
liftIO $ putStrLn $ "Result: " ++ show result

See:

• mmorph

Effect Systems
The mtl model has several properties which make it suboptimal from a theoretical perspective. Although it is used widely
in production Haskell we will discuss its shortcomings and some future models called effect systems.

Extensibility

When you add a new custom transformer inside of our business logic we’ll typically have to derive a large number of
boilerplate instances to compose it inside of existing mtl transformer stack. For example adding MonadReader instance
for n number of undecidable instances that do nothing but mostly lifts. You can see this massive boilerplate all over the
design of the mtl library and its transitive dependencies.
95 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

instance MonadReader r m => MonadReader r (ExceptT e m) where

ask = lift ask
local = mapExceptT . local
reader = lift . reader

instance MonadReader r m => MonadReader r (IdentityT m) where

ask = lift ask
local = mapIdentityT . local
reader = lift . reader

-- Same for ListT, MaybeT, ...

...

This is called the n2 instance problem or the instance boilerplate problem and remains an open problem of mtl.

Composing Transformers

Effects don’t generally commute from a theoretical perspective and as such monad transformer composition is not in
general commutative. For example stacking State and Except is not commutative:

stateExcept :: StateT s (Except e) a -> s -> Either e (a, s)

stateExcept m s = runExcept (runStateT m s)

exceptState :: ExceptT e (State s) a -> s -> (Either e a, s)

exceptState m s = runState (runExceptT m) s

In addition, the standard method of deriving mtl classes for a transformer stack breaks down when using transformer
stacks with the same monad at different layers of the stack. For example stacking multiple State transformers is a
pattern that shows up quite frequently.

newtype Example = StateT Int (State String)

deriving (MonadState Int)

In order to get around this you would have to handwrite the instances for this transformer stack and manually lift anytime
you perform a State action. This is a suboptimal design and difficult to route around without massive boilerplate.

While these problems exist, most users of mtl don’t implement new transformers at all and can get by. However in recent
years there have been written many other libraries that have explored the design space of alternative effect modeling
systems. These systems are still quite early compared to the mtl but some are able to avoid some of the shortcomings
of mtl in favour of newer algebraic models of effects. The two most commonly used libraries are:

• polysemy
• fused-effects

Polysemy
Polysemy is a new effect system library based on the free­monad approach to modeling effects. The library uses modern
type system features to model effects on top of a Sem monad. The monad will have a members constraint type which
constraints a parameter r by a type­level list of effects in the given unit of computation.
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 96

Members [ .. effects .. ] => Sem r a

For example we seamlessly mix and match error handling, tracing, and stateful updates inside of one computation without
the new to create a layered monad. This would look something like the following:

Members '[Trace, State Example, Error MyError] r => Sem r ()

These effects can then be evaluated using an interpreter function which unrolls and potentially evaluates the effects of
the Sem free monad. Some of these interpreters for tracing, state and error are similar to the evaluations for monad
transformers but evaluate one layer of type­level list of the effect stack.

runError :: Sem (Error e ': r) a -> Sem r (Either e a)

runState :: s -> Sem (State s ': r) a -> Sem r (s, a)
runTraceList :: Sem (Trace ': r) a -> Sem r ([String], a)

The resulting Sem monad with a single field can then be lowered into a single resulting monad such as IO or Either.

runFinal :: Monad m => Sem '[Final m] a -> m a

embedToFinal :: (Member (Final m) r, Functor m) => Sem (Embed m ': r) a -> Sem r a

The library provides rich set of of effects that can replace many uses of monad transformers.
• Polysemy.Async ­ Asynchronous computations
• Polysemy.AtomicState ­ Atomic operations
• Polysemy.Error ­ Error handling
• Polysemy.Fail ­ Computations that fail
• Polysemy.IO ­ Monadic IO
• Polysemy.Input ­ Input effects
• Polysemy.Output ­ Output effects
• Polysemy.NonDet ­ Non­determinism effect
• Polysemy.Reader ­ Contextual state a la Reader monad
• Polysemy.Resource ­ Resources with finalizers
• Polysemy.State ­ Stateful effects
• Polysemy.Trace ­ Tracing effect
• Polysemy.Writer ­ Accumulation effect a la Writer monad

For example for a simple stateful computation with only a single effect.

data Example = Example { x :: Int, y :: Int }

deriving (Show)

-- Stateful update to Example datastructure.

example1 :: Member (State Example) r => Sem r ()
example1 = do
modify $ \s -> s {x = 1}
pure ()

runExample1 :: IO ()
97 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

runExample1 = do
(result, _) <-
runFinal
$ embedToFinal @IO
$ runState (Example 0 0) example1
print result

And a more complex example which combines multiple effects:

import Polysemy
import Polysemy.Error
import Polysemy.State
import Polysemy.Trace

data MyError = MyError

deriving (Show)

-- Stateful update to Example datastructure, with errors and tracing.

example2 :: Members '[Trace, State Example, Error MyError] r => Sem r ()
example2 = do
modify $ \s -> s {x = 1, y = 2}
trace "foo"
throw MyError
pure ()

runExample2 :: IO ()
runExample2 = do
result <-
runFinal
$ embedToFinal @IO
$ errorToIOFinal @MyError
$ runState (Example 0 0)
$ traceToIO example2
print result

Polysemy will require the following language extensions to operate:

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}
{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeApplications #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

The use of free­monads is not entirely without cost, and there are experimental GHC plugins which can abstract away
some of the overhead from the effect stack. Code thats makes use of polysemy should enable the following GHC flags
to enable aggressive typeclass specialisation:
• -flate-specialise
• -fspecialise-aggressively
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 98

Fused Effects
Fused­effects is an alternative approach to effect systems based on an algebraic effects model. Unlike polysemy, fused­
effects does not use a free monad as an intermediate form. Fused­effects has competative performance compared with
mtl and doesn’t require additional GHC plugins or extension compiler fusion rules to optimise away the abstraction
overhead.
The fused-effects library exposes a constraint kind called Has which annotates a type signature that contains
effectful logic. In this signature m is called the carrier for the sig effect signature containing the eff effect.

type Has eff sig m = (Members eff sig, Algebra sig m)

For example the traditional State effect is modeled by the following datatype with three parameters. The s parameter
is the state object, the m is the effect parameter. This exposes the same interface as Control.Monad.State except for
the Has constraint instead.

data State s m k
= Get (s -> m k)
| Put s (m k)
deriving (Functor)

get :: Has (State s) sig m => m s

put :: Has (State s) sig m => s -> m ()

The Carrier for the State effect is defined as StateC and the evaluators for the state carrier are defined in the same
interface as mtl except they evaluate into a result containing the effect parameter m .

newtype StateC s m a = StateC (s -> m (s, a))

deriving (Functor)

runState :: s -> StateC s m a -> m (s, a)

The evaluators for the effect lift monadic actions from an effectful computation.

runM :: LiftC m a -> m a

run :: Identity a -> a

Fused­effects requires the following language extensions to operate.

{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

Minimal Example
A minimal example using the State effect to track stateful updates to a single integral value.

example1 :: Has (State Integer) sig m => m Integer

example1 = do
modify (+ 1)
99 MONAD TRANSFORMERS

modify (* 10)
get

The evaluation of this monadic state block results in a m Integer with the Algebra and Effect context. This can then
be evaluated into either Identity or IO using run .

ex1 :: (Algebra sig m, Effect sig) => m Integer

ex1 = evalState (1 :: Integer) example1

run1 :: Identity Integer

run1 = runM ex1

run2 :: IO Integer
run2 = runM ex1

Composite Effects
Consider a more complex example which combines exceptions with Throw effect with State . Importantly note that
functions runThrow and evalState cannot infer the state type from the signature alone and thus require additional
annotations. This differs from mtl which typically has more optimal inference.

example2 ::
( Has (State (Double, Double)) sig m,
Has (Throw ArithException) sig m
) =>
m Double
example2 = do
(a, b) <- get
if b == 0
then throwError DivideByZero
else pure (a / b)

ex2 :: (Algebra sig m, Effect sig) => m (Either ArithException Double)

ex2 = runThrow $ evalState (1 :: Double, 2 :: Double) example2

ex3 :: (Algebra sig m, Effect sig) => m (Either ArithException Double)

ex3 = evalState (1 :: Double, 0 :: Double) (runThrow example2)
MONAD TRANSFORMERS 100
Chapter 4

Language Extensions

Philosophy
Haskell takes a drastically different approach to language design than most other languages as a result of being the
synthesis of input from industrial and academic users. GHC allows the core language itself to be extended with a vast
range of opt­in flags which change the semantics of the language on a per­module or per­project basis. While this does
add a lot of complexity at first, it also adds a level of power and flexibility for the language to evolve at a pace that is
unrivaled in the broader space of programming language design.

Classes
It’s important to distinguish between different classes of GHC language extensions: general and specialized.
The inherent problem with classifying extensions into general and specialized categories is that it is a subjective classifi­
cation. Haskellers who do theorem proving research will have a very different interpretation of Haskell than people who
do web programming. Thus, we will use the following classifications:
• Benign implies both that importing the extension won’t change the semantics of the module if not used and that
enabling it makes it no easier to shoot yourself in the foot.
• Historical implies that one shouldn’t use this extension, it is in GHC purely for backwards compatibility. Some­
times these are dangerous to enable.
• Steals syntax means that enabling this extension causes certain code, that is valid in vanilla Haskell, to be no longer
be accepted. For example, f $(a) is the same as f $ (a) in Haskell98, but TemplateHaskell will interpret
$(a) as a splice.

Benign Historical Extends Syntax Use Use

AllowAmbiguousTypes Specialized Typelevel Programming
Arrows ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
AutoDeriveTypeable Specialized Metaprogramming
BangPatterns ✓ ✓ General Strictness Annotation
CApiFFI Specialized FFI
ConstrainedClassMethods Specialized Typelevel Programming
ConstraintKinds Specialized Typelevel Programming
CPP ✓ ✓ General Preprocessor
DataKinds Specialized Typelevel Programming
DatatypeContexts ✓ ✓ Deprecated Deprecated
DefaultSignatures ✓ Specialized Generic Programming
DeriveDataTypeable ✓ General Generic Programming
DeriveFoldable ✓ General Generic Programming

101
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 102

Benign Historical Extends Syntax Use Use

DeriveFunctor ✓ General Generic Programming
DeriveGeneric ✓ General Generic Programming
DerivingStrategies ✓ General Generic Programming
DeriveTraversable ✓ General Generic Programming
DerivingVia ✓ General Generic Programming
DisambiguateRecordFields ✓ ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
DoRec ✓ ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
EmptyCase Specialized Syntax Extension
EmptyDataDecls ✓ General Syntax Extension
ExistentialQuantification Specialized Typelevel Programming
ExplicitForAll ✓ Specialized Typelevel Programming
ExplicitNamespaces ✓ ✓ Specialized Syntax Disambiguation
ExtendedDefaultRules ✓ Specialized Generic Programming
FlexibleContexts General Typeclass Extension
FlexibleInstances General Typeclass Extension
ForeignFunctionInterface ✓ General FFI
FunctionalDependencies General Typeclass Extension
GADTs General Typelevel Programming
GADTSyntax ✓ General Syntax Extension
GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving General Typeclass Extension
GHCForeignImportPrim Specialized FFI
ImplicitParams Specialized Typelevel Programming
ImpredicativeTypes Specialized Typelevel Programming
IncoherentInstances Specialized Typelevel Programming
InstanceSigs Specialized Typelevel Programming
InterruptibleFFI Specialized FFI
KindSignatures Specialized Typelevel Programming
LambdaCase ✓ ✓ General Syntax Extension
LiberalTypeSynonyms Specialized Typeclass Extension
MagicHash Specialized GHC Internals
MonadComprehensions ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
MonoPatBinds Specialized Type Disambiguation
MultiParamTypeClasses ✓ General Typeclass Extension
MultiWayIf ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
NamedFieldPuns ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
NegativeLiterals General Type Disambiguation
NoImplicitPrelude Specialized Import Disambiguation
NoMonoLocalBinds General Type Disambiguation
NoMonomorphismRestriction General Type Disambiguation
NPlusKPatterns ✓ ✓ Deprecated Deprecated
NullaryTypeClasses Specialized Typeclass Extension
NumDecimals General Type Disambiguation
OverlappingInstances Specialized Typeclass Extension
OverloadedLists ✓ General Syntax Extension
OverloadedStrings General Syntax Extension
PackageImports ✓ General Import Disambiguation
ParallelArrays Specialized Data Parallel Haskell
ParallelListComp ✓ General Syntax Extension
PatternGuards ✓ General Syntax Extension
PatternSynonyms ✓ ✓ General Syntax Extension
PolyKinds Specialized Typelevel Programming
PolymorphicComponents ✓ Specialized Deprecated
PostfixOperators ✓ ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
103 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

Benign Historical Extends Syntax Use Use

QuasiQuotes Specialized Metaprogramming
Rank2Types ✓ Specialized Historical Artificat
RankNTypes Specialized Typelevel Programming
RebindableSyntax ✓ Specialized Metaprogramming
RecordWildCards ✓ ✓ General Syntax Extension
RecursiveDo Specialized Syntax Extension
RelaxedPolyRec Specialized Type Disambiguation
Role Annotations Specialized Type Disambiguation
Safe Specialized Security Auditing
Safe Imports Specialized Security Auditing
ScopedTypeVariables Specialized Typelevel Programming
StandaloneDeriving ✓ ✓ General Typeclass Extension
TemplateHaskell ✓ ✓ Specialized Metaprogramming
TraditionalRecordSyntax ✓ ✓ Specialized Historical Artificat
TransformListComp ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
Trustworthy Specialized Security Auditing
TupleSections ✓ General Syntax Extension
TypeFamilies Specialized Typelevel Programming
TypeHoles ✓ General Interactive Typing
TypeInType ✓ Specialized Typelevel Programming
TypeOperators Specialized Typelevel Programming
TypeSynonymInstances ✓ General Typeclass Extension
UnboxedTuples Specialized FFI
UndecidableInstances Specialized Typelevel Programming
UnicodeSyntax ✓ Specialized Syntax Extension
UnliftedFFITypes Specialized FFI
Unsafe Specialized Security Auditing
ViewPatterns ✓ ✓ General Syntax Extension

The golden source of truth for language extensions is the official GHC user’s guide which contains a plethora of infor­
mation on the details of these extensions.
See: GHC Extension Reference

Extension Dependencies
Some language extensions will implicitly enable other language extensions for their operation. The table below shows
the dependencies between various extensions and which sets are implied.

Extension Implies
TypeFamilyDependencies TypeFamilies
TypeInType PolyKinds, DataKinds, KindSignatures
PolyKinds KindSignatures
ScopedTypeVariables ExplicitForAll
RankNTypes ExplicitForAll
ImpredicativeTypes RankNTypes
TemplateHaskell TemplateHaskellQuotes
Strict StrictData
RebindableSyntax NoImplicitPrelude
TypeOperators ExplicitNamespaces
LiberalTypeSynonyms ExplicitForAll
ExistentialQuantification ExplicitForAll
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 104

Extension Implies
GADTs MonoLocalBinds, GADTSyntax
DuplicateRecordFields DisambiguateRecordFields
RecordWildCards DisambiguateRecordFields
DeriveTraversable DeriveFoldable, DeriveFunctor
MultiParamTypeClasses ConstrainedClassMethods
DerivingVia DerivingStrategies
FunctionalDependencies MultiParamTypeClasses
FlexibleInstances TypeSynonymInstances
TypeFamilies MonoLocalBinds, KindSignatures, ExplicitNamespaces
IncoherentInstances OverlappingInstances

The Benign
It’s not obvious which extensions are the most common but it’s fairly safe to say that these extensions are benign and are
safely used extensively:

• NoImplicitPrelude
• OverloadedStrings
• LambdaCase
• FlexibleContexts
• FlexibleInstances
• GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving
• TypeSynonymInstances
• MultiParamTypeClasses
• FunctionalDependencies
• NoMonomorphismRestriction
• GADTs
• BangPatterns
• DeriveGeneric
• DeriveAnyClass
• DerivingStrategies
• ScopedTypeVariables

The Advanced
These extensions are typically used by advanced projects that push the limits of what is possible with Haskell to enforce
complex invariants and very type­safe APIs.

• PolyKinds
• DataKinds
• DerivingVia
• GADTs
• RankNTypes
• ExistentialQuantification
• TypeFamilies
• TypeOperators
• TypeApplications
• UndecidableInstances
105 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

The Lowlevel
These extensions are typically used by low­level libraries that are striving for optimal performance or need to integrate
with foreign functions and native code. Most of these are used to manipulate base machine types and interface directly
with the low­level byte representations of data structures.
• CPP
• BangPatterns
• CApiFFI
• Strict
• StrictData
• RoleAnnotations
• ForeignFunctionInterface
• InterruptibleFFI
• UnliftedFFITypes
• MagicHash
• UnboxedSums
• UnboxedTuples

The Dangerous
GHC’s typechecker sometimes casually tells us to enable language extensions when it can’t solve certain problems. Unless
you know what you’re doing, these extensions almost always indicate a design flaw and shouldn’t be turned on to remedy
the error at hand, as much as GHC might suggest otherwise!
• AllowAmbigiousTypes
• DatatypeContexts
• OverlappingInstances
• IncoherentInstances
• ImpredicativeTypes

NoMonomorphismRestriction
The NoMonomorphismRestriction allows us to disable the monomorphism restriction typing rule GHC uses by default.
See monomorphism restriction.
For example, if we load the following module into GHCi

module Bad (foo,bar) where

foo x y = x + y
bar = foo 1

And then we attempt to call the function bar with a Double, we get a type error:

λ: bar 1.1
<interactive>:2:5: error:
r No instance for (Fractional Integer)
arising from the literal ‘1.1’
r In the first argument of ‘bar’, namely ‘1.1’
In the expression: bar 1.1
In an equation for ‘it’: it = bar 1.1

The problem is that GHC has inferred an overly specific type:

LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 106

λ: :t bar
bar :: Integer -> Integer

We can prevent GHC from specializing the type with this extension:

{-# LANGUAGE NoMonomorphismRestriction #-}

module Good (foo,bar) where

foo x y = x + y
bar = foo 1

Now everything will work as expected:

λ: :t bar
bar :: Num a => a -> a

ExtendedDefaultRules
In the absence of explicit type signatures, Haskell normally resolves ambiguous literals using several defaulting rules.
When an ambiguous literal is typechecked, if at least one of its typeclass constraints is numeric and all of its classes are
standard library classes, the module’s default list is consulted, and the first type from the list that will satisfy the context
of the type variable is instantiated. For instance, given the following default rules

default (C1 a,...,Cn a)

The following set of heuristics is used to determine what to instantiate the ambiguous type variable to.
1. The type variable a appears in no other constraints
2. All the classes Ci are standard.
3. At least one of the classes Ci is numerical.
The standard default definition is implicitly defined as (Integer, Double)

This is normally fine, but sometimes we’d like more granular control over defaulting. The -XExtendedDefaultRules
loosens the restriction that we’re constrained with working on Numerical typeclasses and the constraint that we can only
work with standard library classes. For example, if we’d like to have our string literals (using -XOverloadedStrings )
automatically default to the more efficient Text implementation instead of String we can twiddle the flag and GHC
will perform the right substitution without the need for an explicit annotation on every string literal.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ExtendedDefaultRules #-}

import qualified Data.Text as T

default (T.Text)

example = "foo"

For code typed at the GHCi prompt, the -XExtendedDefaultRules flag is always on, and cannot be switched off.
107 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

See: Monomorphism Restriction

Safe Haskell
The Safe Haskell language extensions allow us to restrict the use of unsafe language features using -XSafe which restricts
the import of modules which are themselves marked as Safe. It also forbids the use of certain language extensions
( -XTemplateHaskell ) which can be used to produce unsafe code. The primary use case of these extensions is security
auditing of codebases for compliance purposes.

{-# LANGUAGE Safe #-}

{-# LANGUAGE Trustworthy #-}

{-# LANGUAGE Safe #-}

import Unsafe.Coerce
import System.IO.Unsafe

bad1 :: String
bad1 = unsafePerformIO getLine

bad2 :: a
bad2 = unsafeCoerce 3.14 ()

Unsafe.Coerce: Can't be safely imported!

The module itself isn't safe.

See: Safe Haskell

PartialTypeSignatures
Normally a function is either given a full explicit type signature or none at all. The partial type signature extension allows
something in between.
Partial types may be used to avoid writing uninteresting pieces of the signature, which can be convenient in development:

{-# LANGUAGE PartialTypeSignatures #-}

triple :: Int -> _

triple i = (i,i,i)

If the -Wpartial-type-signatures GHC option is set, partial types will still trigger warnings.
See:
• Partial Type Signatures

RecursiveDo
Recursive do notation allows for the use of self­reference expressions on both sides of a monadic bind. For instance the
following example uses lazy evaluation to generate an infinite list. This is sometimes used to instantiate a cyclic datatype
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 108

inside a monadic context where the datatype needs to hold a reference to itself.

{-# LANGUAGE RecursiveDo #-}

justOnes :: Maybe [Int]

justOnes = do
rec xs <- Just (1:xs)
return (map negate xs)

See: Recursive Do Notation

ApplicativeDo
By default GHC desugars do­notation to use implicit invocations of bind and return. With normal monad sugar the
following…

test :: Monad m => m (a, b, c)

test = do
a <- f
b <- g
c <- h
return (a, b, c)

… desugars into:

test :: Monad m => m (a, b, c)

test =
f >>= \a ->
g >>= \b ->
h >>= \c ->
return (a, b, c)

With ApplicativeDo this instead desugars into use of applicative combinators and a laxer Applicative constraint.

test :: Applicative m => m (a, b, c)

test = do
a <- f
b <- g
c <- h
return (a, b, c)

Which is equivalent to the traditional notation.

test :: Applicative m => m (a, b, c)

test = (,,) <$> f <*> g <*> h
109 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

PatternGuards
Pattern guards are an extension to the pattern matching syntax. Given a <- pattern qualifier, the right hand side is
evaluated and matched against the pattern on the left. If the match fails then the whole guard fails and the next equation
is tried. If it succeeds, then the appropriate binding takes place, and the next qualifier is matched.

{-# LANGUAGE PatternGuards #-}

combine env x y
| Just a <- lookup x env
, Just b <- lookup y env
= Just $ a + b

| otherwise = Nothing

ViewPatterns
View patterns are like pattern guards that can be nested inside of other patterns. They are a convenient way of pattern­
matching against values of algebraic data types.

{-# LANGUAGE ViewPatterns #-}

{-# LANGUAGE NoMonomorphismRestriction #-}

import Safe

lookupDefault :: Eq a => a -> b -> [(a,b)] -> b

lookupDefault k _ (lookup k -> Just s) = s
lookupDefault _ d _ = d

headTup :: (a, [t]) -> [t]

headTup (headMay . snd -> Just n) = [n]
headTup _ = []

headNil :: [a] -> [a]

headNil (headMay -> Just x) = [x]
headNil _ = []

TupleSections
The TupleSections syntax extension allows tuples to be constructed similar to how operator sections. With this extension
enabled, tuples of arbitrary size can be “partially” specified with commas and values given for specific positions in the
tuple. For example for a 2­tuple:

{-# LANGUAGE TupleSections #-}

first :: a -> (a, Bool)

first = (,True)

second :: a -> (Bool, a)

second = (True,)
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 110

An example for a 7­tuple where three values are specified in the section.

f :: t -> t1 -> t2 -> t3 -> (t, (), t1, (), (), t2, t3)
f = (,(),,(),(),,)

Postfix Operators
The postfix operators extensions allows user­defined operators that are placed after expressions. For example, using this
extension, we could define a postfix factorial function.

{-# LANGUAGE PostfixOperators #-}

(!) :: Integer -> Integer

(!) n = product [1..n]

example :: Integer
example = (52!)

MultiWayIf
Multi­way if expands traditional if statements to allow pattern match conditions that are equivalent to a chain of if­
then­else statements. This allows us to write “pattern matching predicates” on a value. This alters the syntax of Haskell
language.

{-# LANGUAGE MultiWayIf #-}

bmiTell :: Float -> Text

bmiTell bmi = if
| bmi <= 18.5 -> "Underweight."
| bmi <= 25.0 -> "Average weight."
| bmi <= 30.0 -> "Overweight."
| otherwise -> "Clinically overweight."

EmptyCase
GHC normally requires at least one pattern branch in a case statement; this restriction can be relaxed with the
EmptyCase language extension. The case statement then immediately yields a Non-exhaustive patterns in case
if evaluated. For example, the following will compile using this language pragma:

test = case of
111 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

LambdaCase
For case statements, the language extension LambdaCase allows the elimination of redundant free variables introduced
purely for the case of pattern matching on.
Without LambdaCase:

\temp -> case temp of

p1 -> 32
p2 -> 32

With LambdaCase:

\case
p1 -> 32
p2 -> 32

{-# LANGUAGE LambdaCase #-}

data Exp a
= Lam a (Exp a)
| Var a
| App (Exp a) (Exp a)

example :: Exp a -> a

example = \case
Lam a b -> a
Var a -> a
App a b -> example a

NumDecimals
The extension NumDecimals allows the use of exponential notation for integral literals that are not necessarily floats.
Without it, any use of exponential notation induces a Fractional class constraint.

googol :: Fractional a => a

googol = 1e100

{-# LANGUAGE NumDecimals #-}

googol :: Num a => a
googol = 1e100

PackageImports
The syntax language extension PackageImports allows us to disambiguate hierarchical package names by their re­
spective package key. This is useful in the case where you have two imported packages that expose the same module.
In practice most of the common libraries have taken care to avoid conflicts in the namespace and this is not usually a
problem in most modern Haskell.
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 112

For example we could explicitly ask GHC to resolve that Control.Monad.Error package be drawn from the mtl
library.

import qualified "mtl" Control.Monad.Error as Error

import qualified "mtl" Control.Monad.State as State
import qualified "mtl" Control.Monad.Reader as Reader

RecordWildCards
Record wild cards allow us to expand out the names of a record as variables scoped as the labels of the record implicitly.
The extension can be used to extract variables names into a scope and/or to assign to variables in a record drawing(?),
aligning the record’s labels with the variables in scope for the assignment. The syntax introduced is the {..} pattern
selector as in the following example:

{-# LANGUAGE RecordWildCards #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Data.Text

data Example = Example

{ e1 :: Int
, e2 :: Text
, e3 :: Text
} deriving (Show)

-- Extracting from a record using wildcards.

scope :: Example -> (Int, Text, Text)
scope Example {..} = (e1, e2, e3)

-- Assign to a record using wildcards.

assign :: Example
assign = Example {..}
where
(e1, e2, e3) = (1, "Kirk", "Picard")

NamedFieldPuns
NamedFieldPuns provides alternative syntax for accessing record fields in a pattern match.

data D = D {a :: Int, b :: Int}

f :: D -> Int
f D {a, b} = a - b

-- Order doesn't matter

g :: D -> Int
g D {b, a} = a - b
113 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

PatternSynonyms
Suppose we were writing a typechecker, and we needed to parse type signatures. One common solution would to include
a TArr to pattern match on type function signatures. Even though, technically it could be written in terms of more
basic application of the (->) constructor.

data Type
= TVar TVar
| TCon TyCon
| TApp Type Type
| TArr Type Type
deriving (Show, Eq, Ord)

With pattern synonyms we can eliminate the extraneous constructor without losing the convenience of pattern matching
on arrow types. We introduce a new pattern using the pattern keyword.

{-# LANGUAGE PatternSynonyms #-}

pattern TArr t1 t2 = TApp (TApp (TCon "(->)") t1) t2

So now we can write a deconstructor and constructor for the arrow type very naturally.

{-# LANGUAGE PatternSynonyms #-}

import Data.List (foldl1')

type Name = String

type TVar = String
type TyCon = String

data Type
= TVar TVar
| TCon TyCon
| TApp Type Type
deriving (Show, Eq, Ord)

pattern TArr t1 t2 = TApp (TApp (TCon "(->)") t1) t2

tapp :: TyCon -> [Type] -> Type

tapp tcon args = foldl TApp (TCon tcon) args

arr :: [Type] -> Type

arr ts = foldl1' (\t1 t2 -> tapp "(->)" [t1, t2]) ts

elimTArr :: Type -> [Type]

elimTArr (TArr (TArr t1 t2) t3) = t1 : t2 : elimTArr t3
elimTArr (TArr t1 t2) = t1 : elimTArr t2
elimTArr t = [t]

-- (->) a ((->) b a)
-- a -> b -> a
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 114

to :: Type
to = arr [TVar "a", TVar "b", TVar "a"]

from :: [Type]
from = elimTArr to

Pattern synonyms can be exported from a module like any other definition by prefixing them with the prefix pattern .

module MyModule (
pattern Elt
) where

pattern Elt = [a]

• Pattern Synonyms in GHC 8

DeriveFunctor
Many instances of functors over datatypes with parameters and trivial constructors are the result of trivially applying a
function over the single constructor’s argument. GHC can derive this boilerplate automatically in deriving clauses if
DeriveFunctor is enabled.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

data Tree a = Node a [Tree a]

deriving (Show, Functor)

tree :: Tree Int

tree = fmap (+1) (Node 1 [Node 2 [], Node 3 []])

DeriveFoldable
Similar to how Functors can be automatically derived, many instances of Foldable for types of kind * -> * have
instances that derive the functions:
• foldMap
• foldr
• null
For instance if we have a custom rose tree and binary tree implementation we can automatically derive the fold functions
for these datatypes automatically for us.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFoldable #-}

data RoseTree a
= RoseTree a [RoseTree a]
deriving (Foldable)

data Tree a
= Leaf a
115 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

| Branch (Tree a) (Tree a)

deriving (Foldable)

These will generate the following instances:

instance Foldable RoseTree where

foldr f z (RoseTree a1 a2)
= f a1 ((\ b3 b4 -> foldr (\ b1 b2 -> foldr f b2 b1) b4 b3) a2 z)
foldMap f (RoseTree a1 a2)
= mappend (f a1) (foldMap (foldMap f) a2)
null (RoseTree _ _) = False

instance Foldable Tree where

foldr f z (Leaf a1) = f a1 z
foldr f z (Branch a1 a2)
= (\ b1 b2 -> foldr f b2 b1) a1 ((\ b3 b4 -> foldr f b4 b3) a2 z)
foldMap f (Leaf a1) = f a1
foldMap f (Branch a1 a2) = mappend (foldMap f a1) (foldMap f a2)
null (Leaf _) = False
null (Branch a1 a2) = (&&) (null a1) (null a2)

DeriveTraversable
Just as with Functor and Foldable, many Traversable instances for single­paramater datatypes of kind * -> *
have trivial implementations of the traverse function which can also be derived automatically. By enabling
DeriveTraversable we can use stock deriving to derive these instances for us.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveTraversable #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PartialTypeSignatures #-}

data Tree a = Node a [Tree a]

deriving (Show, Functor, Foldable, Traversable)

tree :: Maybe [Int]

tree = foldMap go (Node [1] [Node [2] [], Node [3,4] []])
where
go [] = Nothing
go xs = Just xs

DeriveGeneric
Data types in Haskell can derived by GHC with the DeriveGenerics extension which is able to define the entire structure
of the Generic instance and associated type families. See Generics for more details on what these types mean.
For example the simple custom List type deriving Generic:

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 116

import GHC.Generics

data List a
= Cons a (List a)
| Nil deriving
(Generic)

Will generate the following Generic instance:

instance Generic (List a) where

type
Rep (List a) =
D1
('MetaData "List" "Ghci3" "MyModule" 'False)
( C1
('MetaCons "Cons" 'PrefixI 'False)
( S1
( 'MetaSel
'Nothing
'NoSourceUnpackedness
'NoSourceStrictness
'DecidedLazy
)
(Rec0 a)
:*: S1
( 'MetaSel
'Nothing
'NoSourceUnpackedness
'NoSourceStrictness
'DecidedLazy
)
(Rec0 (List a))
)
:+: C1 ('MetaCons "Nil" 'PrefixI 'False) U1
)
from x = M1
( case x of
Cons g1 g2 -> L1 (M1 ((:*:) (M1 (K1 g1)) (M1 (K1 g2))))
Nil -> R1 (M1 U1)
)
to (M1 x) = case x of
(L1 (M1 ((:*:) (M1 (K1 g1)) (M1 (K1 g2))))) -> Cons g1 g2
(R1 (M1 U1)) -> Nil

DeriveAnyClass
With -XDeriveAnyClass we can derive any class. The deriving logic generates an instance declaration for the type
with no explicitly­defined methods or with all instances having a specific default implementation given. These are used
extensively with Generics when instances provide empty Minimal Annotations which are all derived from generic logic.

A contrived example of a class with an empty minimal set might be the following:
117 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

{-# LANGUAGE DefaultSignatures #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveAnyClass #-}

class MinimalClass a where

const1 :: a -> Int
default const1 :: a -> Int
const1 _ = 1

const2 :: a -> Int

default const2 :: a -> Int
const2 _ = 2

data Example = Example

deriving (MinimalClass)

main :: IO ()
main = do
print (const1 Example)
print (const2 Example)

DuplicateRecordFields
GHC 8.0 introduced the DuplicateRecordFields extensions which loosens GHC’s restriction on records in the same
module with identical accessors. The precise type that is being projected into is now deferred to the callsite.

{-# LANGUAGE DuplicateRecordFields #-}

data Person = Person { id :: Int }

data Animal = Animal { id :: Int }
data Vegetable = Vegetable { id :: Int }

test :: (Person, Animal, Vegetable)

test = (Person {id = 1}, Animal {id = 2}, Vegetable {id = 3})

Using just DuplicateRecordFields , projection is still not supported so the following will not work.

test :: (Int, Int, Int)

test = (id (Person 1), id (Animal 2), id (Animal 3))

OverloadedLabels
GHC 8.0 also introduced the OverloadedLabels extension which allows a limited form of polymorphism over labels
that share the same name.

To work with overloaded label types we also need to enable several language extensions that allow us to use the promoted
strings and multiparam typeclasses that underlay its implementation.
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 118

extract :: IsLabel "id" t => t

extract = #id

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedLabels #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DuplicateRecordFields #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ExistentialQuantification #-}

import GHC.Records (HasField(..)) -- Since base 4.10.0.0

import GHC.OverloadedLabels (IsLabel(..))

data S = MkS { foo :: Int }

data T x y z = forall b . MkT { foo :: y, bar :: b }

instance HasField x r a => IsLabel x (r -> a) where

fromLabel = getField

main :: IO ()
main = do
print (#foo (MkS 42))
print (#foo (MkT True False))

This is used in more advanced libraries like Selda which do object relational mapping between Haskell datatype fields
and database columns.
See:
• OverloadedRecordFields revived

CPP
The C++ preprocessor is the fallback whenever we really need to separate out logic that has to span multiple versions of
GHC and language changes while maintaining backwards compatibility. It can dispatch on the version of GHC being
used to compile a module.

{-# LANGUAGE CPP #-}

#if (__GLASGOW_HASKELL__ > 710)

-- Imports for GHC 7.10.x
#else
-- Imports for other GHC
#endif

It can also demarcate code based on the operating system compiled on.

{-# LANGUAGE CPP #-}

#ifdef OS_Linux
-- Linux specific logic
119 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

#else
# ifdef OS_Win32
-- Windows specific logic
# else
# ifdef OS_Mac
-- Mac specific logic
# else
-- Other operating systems
# endif
# endif
#endif

For another example, it can distinguish the version of the base library used.

#if !MIN_VERSION_base(4,6,0)
-- Base specific logic
#endif

One can also use the CPP extension to emit Haskell source at compile­time. This is used in some libraries which have
massive boilerplate obligations. Of course, this can be abused quite easily and doing this sort of compile­time string­
munging should be a last resort.

TypeApplications
The type system extension TypeApplications allows you to use explicit annotations for subexpressions. For example
if you have a subexpression which has the inferred type a -> b -> a you can name the types of a and b by explicitly
stating @Int @Bool to assign a to Int and b to Bool . This is particularly useful when working with typeclasses
where type inference cannot deduce the types of all subexpressions from the toplevel signature and results in an overly
specific default. This is quite common when working with roundtrips of read and show . For example:

{-# LANGUAGE TypeApplications #-}

import Data.Proxy

a :: Proxy Int
a = Proxy @Int

b :: String
b = show (read @Int "42")

DerivingVia
DerivingVia is an extension of GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving . Just as newtype deriving allows us to derive in­
stances in terms of instances for the underlying representation of the newtype, DerivingVia allows deriving instances by
specifying a custom type which has a runtime representation equal to the desired behavior we’re deriving the instance
for. The derived instance can then be coerced to behave as if it were operating over the given type. This is a powerful
new mechanism that allows us to derive many typeclasses in terms of other typeclasses.
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 120

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DerivingVia #-}
{-# LANGUAGE GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

import Control.Applicative
import Data.Functor.Const (Const (..))
import GHC.Exts (Any)

-- Deriving Eq in terms of Const functor

newtype Age = MkAge Int
deriving
(Eq)
via Const Int Any

-- Deriving Num across a nested functor

newtype FNum f a = FNum (f a)
deriving stock (Functor)
deriving newtype (Applicative)

instance (Applicative f, Num a) => Num (FNum f a) where

(+) = liftA2 (+)
(-) = liftA2 (-)
(*) = liftA2 (*)
abs = fmap abs
signum = fmap signum
fromInteger = FNum . pure . fromInteger

newtype Example a b = Example (Either a b)

deriving stock (Show, Functor)
deriving newtype (Applicative)
deriving (Num) via FNum (Either a) b

a :: Example Integer Integer

a = Example (Left 1)

b :: Example Integer Integer

b = Example (Right 1)

example :: IO ()
example = do
print (a + a)
print (a + b)
print (b + b)

DerivingStrategies
Deriving has proven a powerful mechanism to add typeclass instances and as such there have been a variety of bifurcations
in its use. Since GHC 8.2 there are now four different algorithms that can be used to derive typeclass instances. These
are enabled by different extensions and now have specific syntax for invoking each algorithm specifically. Turning on
DerivingStrategies allows you to disambiguate which algorithm GHC should use for individual class derivations.
121 LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS

• stock ­ Standard GHC builtin deriving (i.e. Eq , Ord , Show )

• anyclass ­ Deriving via minimal annotations with DeriveAnyClass.
• newtype ­ Deriving with [GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving].
• via ­ Deriving with DerivingVia.

These can be stacked and combined on top of a data or newtype declaration.

newtype Example = Example Int

deriving stock (Read, Show)
deriving newtype (Num, Floating)
deriving anyclass (ToJSON, FromJSON, ToSQL, FromSQL)
deriving (Eq) via (Const Int Any)

Historical Extensions
Several language extensions have either been absorbed into the core language or become deprecated in favor of others.
Others are just considered misfeatures.
• Rank2Types ­ Rank2Types has been subsumed by RankNTypes
• XPolymorphicComponents ­ Was an implementation detail of higher­rank polymorphism that no longer exists.
• NPlusKPatterns ­ These were largely considered an ugly edge­case of pattern matching language that was best
removed.
• TraditionalRecordSyntax ­ Traditional record syntax was an extension to the Haskell 98 specification for what
we now consider standard record syntax.
• OverlappingInstances ­ Subsumed by explicit OVERLAPPING pragmas.
• IncoherentInstances ­ Subsumed by explicit INCOHERENT pragmas.
• NullaryTypeClasses ­ Subsumed by explicit Multiparameter Typeclasses with no parameters.
• TypeInType ­ Is deprecated in favour of the combination of PolyKinds and DataKinds and extensions to
the GHC typesystem after GHC 8.0.
LANGUAGE EXTENSIONS 122
Chapter 5

Type Class Extensions

Typeclasses are the bread and butter of abstractions in Haskell, and even out of the box in Haskell 98 they are quite
powerful. However classes have grown quite a few extensions, additional syntax and enhancements over the years to
augment their utility.

-- +-----+------------------ Typeclass Context

-- | | +------ Typeclass Head
-- | | |
-- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^
class (Ctx1 a, Ctx2 b) => MyClass a b where
method1 :: a -> b
-- |
-- +------------------------ Typeclass Method

Standard Hierarchy
In the course of writing Haskell there are seven core instances you will use and derive most frequently. Each of them are
lawful classes with several equations associated with their methods.

• Semigroup
• Monoid
• Functor
• Applicative
• Monad
• Foldable
• Traversable

123
TYPE CLASS EXTENSIONS 124

Instance Search
Whenever a typeclass method is invoked at a callsite, GHC will perform an instance search over all available instances
defined for the given typeclass associated with the method. This instance search is quite similar to backward chaining in
logic programming languages. The search is performed during compilation after all types in all modules are known and
is performed globally across all modules and all packages available to be linked. The instance search can either result in
no instances, a single instance or multiple instances which satisfy the conditions of the call site.

Orphan Instances
Normally typeclass definitions are restricted to be defined in one of two places:
1. In the same module as the declaration of the datatype in the instance head.
2. In the same module as the class declaration.
These two restrictions restrict the instance search space to a system where a solution (if it exists) can always be found.
If we allowed instances to be defined in any modules then we could potentially have multiple class instances defined in
multiple modules and the search would be ambiguous.
This restriction can however be disabled with the -fno-warn-orphans flag.

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -fno-warn-orphans #-}

This will allow you to define orphan instances in the current module. But beware this will make the instance search
contingent on your import list and may result in clashes in your codebase where the linker will fail because there are
multiple modules which define the same instance head.
When used appropriately this can be the way to route around the fact that upstream modules may define datatypes that
you use, but they have not defined the instances for other downstream libraries that you also use. You can then write
these instances for your codebase without modifying either upstream library.

Minimal Annotations
In the presence of default implementations for typeclass methods, there may be several ways to implement a typeclass.
For instance Eq is entirely defined by either defining when two values are equal or not equal by implying taking the
125 TYPE CLASS EXTENSIONS

negation of the other. We can define equality in terms of non­equality and vice­versa.

class Eq a where
(==), (/=) :: a -> a -> Bool
x == y = not (x /= y)
x /= y = not (x == y)

Before 7.6.1 there was no way to specify what was the “minimal” definition required to implement a typeclass

class Eq a where
(==), (/=) :: a -> a -> Bool
x == y = not (x /= y)
x /= y = not (x == y)
{-# MINIMAL (==) #-}
{-# MINIMAL (/=) #-}

Minimal pragmas are boolean expressions. For instance, with | as logical OR , either definition of the above functions
must be defined. Comma indicates logical AND where both definitions must be defined.

{-# MINIMAL (==) | (/=) #-} -- Either (==) or (/=)

{-# MINIMAL (==) , (/=) #-} -- Both (==) and (/=)

Compiling the -Wmissing-methods will warn when an instance is defined that does not meet the minimal criterion.

TypeSynonymInstances
Normally type class definitions are restricted to being defined only over fully expanded types with all type synonym
indirections removed. Type synonyms introduce a “naming indirection” that can be included in the instance search to
allow you to write synonym instances for multiple synonyms which expand to concrete types.

This is used quite often in modern Haskell.

{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

type IntList = [Int]

class MyClass a

-- Without type synonym instances, we're forced to manually expand out type
-- synonyms in the typeclass head.
instance MyClass [Int]

-- With it GHC will do this for us automatically. Type synonyms still need to
-- be fully applied.
instance MyClass IntList
TYPE CLASS EXTENSIONS 126

FlexibleInstances
Normally the head of a typeclass instance must contain only a type constructor applied to any number of type variables.
There can be no nesting of other constructors or non­type variables in the head. The FlexibleInstances extension
loosens this restriction to allow arbitrary nesting and non­type variables to be mentioned in the head definition. This
extension also implicitly enables TypeSynonymInstances .

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

class MyClass a

-- Without flexible instances, all instance heads must be type variable. The
-- following would be legal.
instance MyClass (Maybe a)

-- With flexible instances, typeclass heads can be arbitrary nested types. The
-- following would be forbidden without it.
instance MyClass (Maybe Int)

FlexibleContexts
Just as with instances, contexts normally are also constrained to consist entirely of constraints where a class is applied
to just type variables. The FlexibleContexts extension lifts this restriction and allows any type of type variable and
nesting to occur the class constraint head. There is however still a global restriction that all class hierarchies must not
contain cycles.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

class MyClass a

-- Without flexible contexts, all contexts must be type variable. The

-- following would be legal.
instance (MyClass a) => MyClass (Either a b)

-- With flexible contexts, typeclass contexts can be arbitrary nested types. The
-- following would be forbidden without it.
instance (MyClass (Maybe a)) => MyClass (Either a b)

OverlappingInstances
Typeclasses are normally globally coherent, there is only ever one instance that can be resolved for a type unambiguously
at any call site in the program. There are however extensions to loosen this restriction and perform more manual direction
of the instance search.
Overlapping instances loosens the coherent condition (there can be multiple instances) but introduces a criterion that it
will resolve to the most specific one.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverlappingInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
127 TYPE CLASS EXTENSIONS

class MyClass a b where

fn :: (a,b)

instance MyClass Int b where

fn = error "b"

instance MyClass a Int where

fn = error "a"

instance MyClass Int Int where

fn = error "c"

example :: (Int, Int)

example = fn

Historically enabling on the module­level was not the best idea, since generally we define multiple classes in a module
only a subset of which may be incoherent. As of GHC 7.10 we now have the capacity to just annotate instances with
the OVERLAPPING and INCOHERENT inline pragmas.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

class MyClass a b where

fn :: (a,b)

instance {-# OVERLAPPING #-} MyClass Int b where

fn = error "b"

instance {-# OVERLAPPING #-} MyClass a Int where

fn = error "a"

instance {-# OVERLAPPING #-} MyClass Int Int where

fn = error "c"

example :: (Int, Int)

example = fn

IncoherentInstances
Incoherent instances loosens the restriction that there be only one specific instance, it will be chosen based on a more
complex search procedure which tries to identify a prime instance based on information incorporated form OVERLAPPING
pragmas on instances in the search tree. Unless one is doing very advanced type­level programming use class constraints,
this is usually a poor design decision and a sign to rethink the class hierarchy.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE IncoherentInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

class MyClass a b where

fn :: (a,b)
TYPE CLASS EXTENSIONS 128

instance MyClass Int b where

fn = error "a"

instance MyClass a Int where

fn = error "b"

example :: (Int, Int)

example = fn

An example with INCOHERENT annotations:

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

class MyClass a b where

fn :: (a,b)

instance {-# INCOHERENT #-} MyClass a Int where

fn = error "general"

instance {-# INCOHERENT #-} MyClass Int Int where

fn = error "specific"

example :: (Int, Int)

example = fn
Chapter 6

Laziness

Haskell is a unique language that explores an alternative evaluation model called lazy evaluation. Lazy evaluation implies
that expressions will be evaluated only when needed. In truth, this evaluation may even be indefinitely deferred. Consider
the example in Haskell of defining an infinite list:

λ> mkInfinite n = n : mkInfinite n

λ> take 5 $ mkInfinite 4
[4,4,4,4,4]

The primary advantage of lazy evaluation in the large is that algorithms that operate over both unbounded and bounded
data structures can inhabit the same type signatures and be composed without any additional need to restructure their
logic or force intermediate computations.
Still, it’s important to recognize that this is another subject on which much ink has been spilled. In fact, there is an
ongoing discussion in the land of Haskell about the compromises between lazy and strict evaluation, and there are
nuanced arguments for having either paradigm be the default.
Haskell takes a hybrid approach where it allows strict evaluation when needed while it uses laziness by default. Needless
to say, we can always find examples where strict evaluation exhibits worse behavior than lazy evaluation and vice versa.
These days Haskell can be both as lazy or as strict as you like, giving you options for however you prefer to program.
Languages that attempt to bolt laziness on to a strict evaluation model often bifurcate classes of algorithms into ones
that are hand­adjusted to consume unbounded structures and those which operate over bounded structures. In strict
languages, mixing and matching between lazy vs. strict processing often necessitates manifesting large intermediate struc­
tures in memory when such composition would “just work” in a lazy language.
By virtue of Haskell being the only language to actually explore this point in the design space, knowledge about lazy
evaluation is not widely absorbed into the collective programmer consciousness and can often be non­intuitive to the
novice. Some time is often needed to fully grok how lazy evaluation works

Strictness
For a more strict definition of strictnees, consider that there are several evaluation models for the lambda calculus:
• Strict ­ Evaluation is said to be strict if all arguments are evaluated before the body of a function.
• Non­strict ­ Evaluation is non­strict if the arguments are not necessarily evaluated before entering the body of a
function.
These ideas give rise to several models, Haskell itself uses the call­by­need model.

129
LAZINESS 130

Model Strictness Description

Call­by­value Strict Arguments evaluated before function entered
Call­by­name Non­strict Arguments passed unevaluated
Call­by­need Non­strict Arguments passed unevaluated but an expression is only evaluated once

Seq and WHNF

On the subject of laziness and evaluation, we have names for how fully evaluated an expression is. A term is said to be
in weak head normal­form if the outermost constructor or lambda expression cannot be reduced further. A term is said
to be in normal form if it is fully evaluated and all sub­expressions and thunks contained within are evaluated.

-- In Normal Form
42
(2, "foo")
\x -> x + 1

-- Not in Normal Form

1 + 2
(\x -> x + 1) 2
"foo" ++ "bar"
(1 + 1, "foo")

-- In Weak Head Normal Form

(1 + 1, "foo")
\x -> 2 + 2
'f' : ("oo" ++ "bar")

-- Not In Weak Head Normal Form

1 + 1
(\x -> x + 1) 2
"foo" ++ "bar"

In Haskell, normal evaluation only occurs at the outer constructor of case­statements in Core. If we pattern match on a
list, we don’t implicitly force all values in the list. An element in a data structure is only evaluated up to the outermost
constructor. For example, to evaluate the length of a list we need only scrutinize the outer Cons constructors without
regard for their inner values:

λ: length [undefined, 1]
2

λ: head [undefined, 1]
Prelude.undefined

λ: snd (undefined, 1)
1

λ: fst (undefined, 1)
Prelude.undefined

For example, in a lazy language the following program terminates even though it contains diverging terms.
131 LAZINESS

ignore :: a -> Int

ignore x = 0

loop :: a
loop = loop

main :: IO ()
main = print $ ignore loop

In a strict language like OCaml (ignoring its suspensions for the moment), the same program diverges.

let ignore x = 0;;

let rec loop a = loop a;;

print_int (ignore (loop ()));

Thunks
In Haskell a thunk is created to stand for an unevaluated computation. Evaluation of a thunk is called forcing the thunk.
The result is an update, a referentially transparent effect, which replaces the memory representation of the thunk with the
computed value. The fundamental idea is that a thunk is only updated once (although it may be forced simultaneously
in a multi­threaded environment) and its resulting value is shared when referenced subsequently.
The GHCi command :sprint can be used to introspect the state of unevaluated thunks inside an expression without
forcing evaluation. For instance:

λ: let a = [1..] :: [Integer]

λ: let b = map (+ 1) a

λ: :sprint a
a = _
λ: :sprint b
b = _
λ: a !! 4
5
λ: :sprint a
a = 1 : 2 : 3 : 4 : 5 : _
λ: b !! 10
12
λ: :sprint a
a = 1 : 2 : 3 : 4 : 5 : 6 : 7 : 8 : 9 : 10 : 11 : _
λ: :sprint b
b = _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : _ : 12 : _

While a thunk is being computed its memory representation is replaced with a special form known as blackhole which
indicates that computation is ongoing and allows for a short circuit when a computation might depend on itself to
complete.
The seq function introduces an artificial dependence on the evaluation of order of two terms by requiring that the first
argument be evaluated to WHNF before the evaluation of the second. The implementation of the seq function is an
implementation detail of GHC.
LAZINESS 132

seq :: a -> b -> b

⊥ `seq` a = ⊥
a `seq` b = b

For one example where laziness can bite you, the infamous foldl is well­known to leak space when used carelessly and
without several compiler optimizations applied. The strict foldl’ variant uses seq to overcome this.

foldl :: (a -> b -> a) -> a -> [b] -> a

foldl f z [] = z
foldl f z (x:xs) = foldl f (f z x) xs

foldl' :: (a -> b -> a) -> a -> [b] -> a

foldl' _ z [] = z
foldl' f z (x:xs) = let z' = f z x in z' `seq` foldl' f z' xs

In practice, a combination between the strictness analyzer and the inliner on -O2 will ensure that the strict variant of
foldl is used whenever the function is inlinable at call site so manually using foldl' is most often not required.

Of important note is that GHCi runs without any optimizations applied so the same program that performs poorly in
GHCi may not have the same performance characteristics when compiled with GHC.

BangPatterns
The extension BangPatterns allows an alternative syntax to force arguments to functions to be wrapped in seq. A bang
operator on an argument forces its evaluation to weak head normal form before performing the pattern match. This can
be used to keep specific arguments evaluated throughout recursion instead of creating a giant chain of thunks.

{-# LANGUAGE BangPatterns #-}

sum :: Num a => [a] -> a

sum = go 0
where
go !acc (x:xs) = go (acc + x) xs
go acc [] = acc

This is desugared into code effectively equivalent to the following:

sum :: Num a => [a] -> a

sum = go 0
where
go acc _ | acc `seq` False = undefined
go acc (x:xs) = go (acc + x) xs
go acc [] = acc

Function application to seq’d arguments is common enough that it has a special operator.
133 LAZINESS

($!) :: (a -> b) -> a -> b

f $! x = let !vx = x in f vx

StrictData
As of GHC 8.0 strictness annotations can be applied to all definitions in a module automatically. In previous versions
to make definitions strict it was necessary to use explicit syntactic annotations at call sites.
Enabling StrictData makes constructor fields strict by default on any module where the pragma is enabled:

{-# LANGUAGE StrictData #-}

data Employee = Employee

{ name :: T.Text
, age :: Int
}

Is equivalent to:

data Employee = Employee

{ name :: !T.Text
, age :: !Int
}

Strict
Strict implies -XStrictData and extends strictness annotations to all arguments of functions.

f x y = x + y

Is equivalent to the following function declaration with explicit bang patterns:

f !x !y = x + y

On a module­level this effectively makes Haskell a call­by­value language with some caveats. All arguments to functions
are now explicitly evaluated and all data in constructors within this module are in head normal form by construction.

Deepseq
There are often times when for performance reasons we need to deeply evaluate a data structure to normal form leaving
no terms unevaluated. The deepseq library performs this task.

The typeclass NFData (Normal Form Data) allows us to seq all elements of a structure across any subtypes which
themselves implement NFData.

class NFData a where

rnf :: a -> ()
LAZINESS 134

rnf a = a `seq` ()

deepseq :: NFData a => a -> b -> b

($!!) :: (NFData a) => (a -> b) -> a -> b

instance NFData Int

instance NFData (a -> b)

instance NFData a => NFData (Maybe a) where

rnf Nothing = ()
rnf (Just x) = rnf x

instance NFData a => NFData [a] where

rnf [] = ()
rnf (x:xs) = rnf x `seq` rnf xs

[1, undefined] `seq` ()

-- ()

[1, undefined] `deepseq` ()

-- Prelude.undefined

To force a data structure itself to be fully evaluated we share the same argument in both positions of deepseq.

force :: NFData a => a -> a

force x = x `deepseq` x

Irrefutable Patterns
A lazy pattern doesn’t require a match on the outer constructor, instead it lazily calls the accessors of the values as needed.
In the presence of a bottom, we fail at the usage site instead of the outer pattern match.

f :: (a, b) -> Int

f (a,b) = const 1 a

g :: (a, b) -> Int

g ~(a,b) = const 1 a

-- λ: f undefined
-- *** Exception: Prelude.undefined
-- λ: g undefined
-- 1

j :: Maybe t -> t
j ~(Just x) = x

k :: Maybe t -> t
k (Just x) = x
135 LAZINESS

-- λ: j Nothing
-- *** Exception: src/05-laziness/lazy_patterns.hs:15:1-15: Irrefutable pattern failed for pattern (Just x)
--
-- λ: k Nothing
-- *** Exception: src/05-laziness/lazy_patterns.hs:18:1-14: Non-exhaustive patterns in function k

The Debate
Laziness is a controversial design decision in Haskell. It is difficult to write production Haskell code that operates in
constant memory without some insight into the evaluation model and the runtime. A lot of industrial codebases have a
policy of marking all constructors as strict by default or enabling StrictData to prevent space leaks. If Haskell were being
designed from scratch it probably would not choose laziness as the default model. Future implementations of Haskell
compilers would not choose this point in the design space if given the option of breaking with the language specification.
There is a lot of fear, uncertainty and doubt spread about lazy evaluation that unfortunately loses the forest for the trees
and ignores 30 years of advanced research on the type system. In industrial programming a lot of software is sold on
the meme of being of fast instead of being correct, and lazy evaluation is an intellectually easy talking point about these
upside­down priorities. Nevertheless the colloquial perception of laziness being “evil” is a meme that will continue to
persist regardless of any underlying reality because software is intrinsically a social process.
LAZINESS 136
Chapter 7

Prelude

What to Avoid?
Haskell being a 30 year old language has witnessed several revolutions in the way we structure and compose functional
programs. Yet as a result several portions of the Prelude still reflect old schools of thought that simply can’t be removed
without breaking significant parts of the ecosystem.
Currently it really only exists in folklore which parts to use and which not to use, although this is a topic that almost all
introductory books don’t mention and instead make extensive use of the Prelude for simplicity’s sake.
The short version of the advice on the Prelude is:
• Avoid String.
• Use fmap instead of map .
• Use Foldable and Traversable instead of the Control.Monad, and Data.List versions of traversals.
• Avoid partial functions like head and read or use their total variants.
• Avoid exceptions, use ExceptT or Either instead.
• Avoid boolean blind functions.
The instances of Foldable for the list type often conflict with the monomorphic versions in the Prelude which are left in
for historical reasons. So oftentimes it is desirable to explicitly mask these functions from implicit import and force the
use of Foldable and Traversable instead.
Of course oftentimes one wishes to only use the Prelude explicitly and one can explicitly import it qualified and use the
pieces as desired without the implicit import of the whole namespace.

import qualified Prelude as P

What Should be in Prelude

To get work done on industrial projects you probably need the following libraries:
• text
• containers
• unordered-containers
• mtl
• transformers
• vector
• filepath
• directory

137
PRELUDE 138

• process
• bytestring
• optparse-applicative
• unix
• aeson

Custom Preludes
The default Prelude can be disabled in its entirety by twiddling the -XNoImplicitPrelude flag which allows us to
replace the default import entirely with a custom prelude. Many industrial projects will roll their own Prologue.hs
module which replaces the legacy prelude.

{-# LANGUAGE NoImplicitPrelude #-}

For example if we wanted to build up a custom project prelude we could construct a Prologue module and dump the
relevant namespaces we want from base into our custom export list. Using the module reexport feature allows us to
create an Exports namespace which contains our Prelude’s symbols. Every subsequent module in our project will then
have import Prologue as the first import.

module Prologue (
module Exports,
) where

import Data.Int as Exports

import Data.Tuple as Exports
import Data.Maybe as Exports
import Data.String as Exports
import Data.Foldable as Exports
import Data.Traversable as Exports

import Control.Monad.Trans.Except
as Exports
(ExceptT(ExceptT), Except, except, runExcept, runExceptT,
mapExcept, mapExceptT, withExcept, withExceptT)

Preludes
There are many approaches to custom preludes. The most widely used ones are all available on Hackage.
• base­prelude
• rio
• protolude
• relude
• foundation
• rebase
• classy­prelude
• basic­prelude
Different preludes take different approaches to defining what the Haskell standard library should be. Some are inter­
operable with existing code and others require an “all­in” approach that creates an ecosystem around it. Some projects
139 PRELUDE

are more community efforts and others are developed by consulting companies or industrial users wishing to standardise
their commercial code.
In Modern Haskell there are many different perspectives on Prelude design and the degree to which more advanced ideas
should be used. Which one is right for you is a matter of personal preference and constraints in your company.

Protolude
Protolude is a minimalist Prelude which provides many sensible defaults for writing modern Haskell and is compatible
with existing code.

{-# LANGUAGE NoImplicitPrelude #-}

import Protolude

Protolude is one of the more conservative preludes and is developed by the author of this document.
See:
• Protolude Hackage
• Protolude Github

Partial Functions
A partial function is a function which doesn’t terminate and yield a value for all given inputs. Conversely a total function
terminates and is always defined for all inputs. As mentioned previously, certain historical parts of the Prelude are full of
partial functions.
The difference between partial and total functions is the compiler can’t reason about the runtime safety of partial functions
purely from the information specified in the language and as such the proof of safety is left to the user to guarantee. They
are safe to use in the case where the user can guarantee that invalid inputs cannot occur, but like any unchecked property
its safety or not­safety is going to depend on the diligence of the programmer. This very much goes against the overall
philosophy of Haskell and as such they are discouraged when not necessary.

head :: [a] -> a

read :: Read a => String -> a
(!!) :: [a] -> Int -> a

A list of partial functions in the default prelude:

Partial for all inputs
• error
• undefined
• fail – For Monad IO
Partial for empty lists
• head
• init
• tail
• last
• foldl
• foldr
• foldl'
PRELUDE 140

• foldr'
• foldr1
• foldl1
• cycle
• maximum
• minimum

Partial for Nothing

• fromJust

Partial for invalid strings lists

• read

Partial for infinite lists

• sum
• product
• reverse

Partial for negative or unbounded numbers

• (!)
• (!!)
• toEnum
• genericIndex

Replacing Partiality
The Prelude has total variants of the historical partial functions (e.g. Text.Read.readMaybe ) in some cases, but often
these are found in the various replacement preludes

The total versions provided fall into three cases:

• May ­ return Nothing when the function is not defined for the inputs
• Def ­ provide a default value when the function is not defined for the inputs
• Note ­ call error with a custom error message when the function is not defined for the inputs. This is not safe,
but slightly easier to debug!

-- Total
headMay :: [a] -> Maybe a
readMay :: Read a => String -> Maybe a
atMay :: [a] -> Int -> Maybe a

-- Total
headDef :: a -> [a] -> a
readDef :: Read a => a -> String -> a
atDef :: a -> [a] -> Int -> a

-- Partial
headNote :: String -> [a] -> a
readNote :: Read a => String -> String -> a
atNote :: String -> [a] -> Int -> a
141 PRELUDE

Boolean Blindness
Boolean blindness is a common problem found in many programming languages. Consider the following two definitions
which deconstruct a Maybe value into a boolean. Is there anything wrong with the definitions and below and why is this
not caught in the type system?

data Bool = True | False

isNotJust :: Maybe a -> Bool

isNotJust (Just x) = True -- ???
isNotJust Nothing = False

isJust :: Maybe a -> Bool

isJust (Just x) = True
isJust Nothing = False

The problem with the Bool type is that there is effectively no difference between True and False at the type level. A
proposition taking a value to a Bool takes any information given and destroys it. To reason about the behavior we have
to trace the provenance of the proposition we’re getting the boolean answer from, and this introduces a whole slew of
possibilities for misinterpretation. In the worst case, the only way to reason about safe and unsafe use of a function is by
trusting that a predicate’s lexical name reflects its provenance!

For instance, testing some proposition over a Bool value representing whether the branch can perform the computation
safely in the presence of a null is subject to accidental interchange. Consider that in a language like C or Python testing
whether a value is null is indistinguishable to the language from testing whether the value is not null. Which of these
programs encodes safe usage and which segfaults?

# This one?
if p(x):
# use x
elif not p(x):
# don't use x

# Or this one?
if p(x):
# don't use x
elif not p(x):
# use x

From inspection we can’t tell without knowing how p is defined, the compiler can’t distinguish the two either and thus
the language won’t save us if we happen to mix them up. Instead of making invalid states unrepresentable we’ve made the
invalid state indistinguishable from the valid one!

The more desirable practice is to match on terms which explicitly witness the proposition as a type (often in a sum type)
and won’t typecheck otherwise.

case x of
Just a -> use x
Nothing -> don't use x

-- not ideal
case p x of
True -> use x
PRELUDE 142

False -> don't use x

-- not ideal
if p x
then use x
else don't use x

To be fair though, many popular languages completely lack the notion of sum types (the source of many woes in my
opinion) and only have product types, so this type of reasoning sometimes has no direct equivalence for those not familiar
with ML family languages.

In Haskell, the Prelude provides functions like isJust and fromJust both of which can be used to subvert this kind
of reasoning and make it easy to introduce bugs and should often be avoided.

Foldable / Traversable
If coming from an imperative background retraining oneself to think about iteration over lists in terms of maps, folds,
and scans can be challenging.

Prelude.foldl :: (a -> b -> a) -> a -> [b] -> a

Prelude.foldr :: (a -> b -> b) -> b -> [a] -> b

-- pseudocode
foldr f z [a...] = f a (f b ( ... (f y z) ... ))
foldl f z [a...] = f ... (f (f z a) b) ... y

For a concrete example consider the simple arithmetic sequence over the binary operator (+) :

-- foldr (+) 1 [2..]

(1 + (2 + (3 + (4 + ...))))

-- foldl (+) 1 [2..]

((((1 + 2) + 3) + 4) + ...)

Foldable and Traversable are the general interface for all traversals and folds of any data structure which is parameterized
over its element type ( List, Map, Set, Maybe, …). These two classes are used everywhere in modern Haskell and are
extremely important.

A foldable instance allows us to apply functions to data types of monoidal values that collapse the structure using some
logic over mappend .

A traversable instance allows us to apply functions to data types that walk the structure left­to­right within an applicative
context.

class (Functor f, Foldable f) => Traversable f where

traverse :: Applicative g => (a -> g b) -> f a -> g (f b)

class Foldable f where

foldMap :: Monoid m => (a -> m) -> f a -> m
143 PRELUDE

The foldMap function is extremely general and non­intuitively many of the monomorphic list folds can themselves be
written in terms of this single polymorphic function.
foldMap takes a function of values to a monoidal quantity, a functor over the values and collapses the functor into the
monoid. For instance for the trivial Sum monoid:

λ: foldMap Sum [1..10]

Sum {getSum = 55}

For instance if we wanted to map a list of some abstract element types into a hashtable of elements based on pattern
matching we could use it.

import Data.Foldable
import qualified Data.Map as Map

data Elt
= Elt Int Double
| Nil

foo :: [Elt] -> Map.Map Int Double

foo = foldMap go
where
go (Elt x y) = Map.singleton x y
go Nil = Map.empty

The full Foldable class (with all default implementations) contains a variety of derived functions which themselves can
be written in terms of foldMap and Endo .

newtype Endo a = Endo {appEndo :: a -> a}

instance Monoid (Endo a) where

mempty = Endo id
Endo f `mappend` Endo g = Endo (f . g)

class Foldable t where

fold :: Monoid m => t m -> m
foldMap :: Monoid m => (a -> m) -> t a -> m

foldr :: (a -> b -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

foldr' :: (a -> b -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

foldl :: (b -> a -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

foldl' :: (b -> a -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

foldr1 :: (a -> a -> a) -> t a -> a

foldl1 :: (a -> a -> a) -> t a -> a

For example:

foldr :: (a -> b -> b) -> b -> t a -> b

foldr f z t = appEndo (foldMap (Endo . f) t) z
PRELUDE 144

Most of the operations over lists can be generalized in terms of combinations of Foldable and Traversable to derive more
general functions that work over all data structures implementing Foldable.

Data.Foldable.elem :: (Eq a, Foldable t) => a -> t a -> Bool

Data.Foldable.sum :: (Num a, Foldable t) => t a -> a
Data.Foldable.minimum :: (Ord a, Foldable t) => t a -> a
Data.Traversable.mapM :: (Monad m, Traversable t) => (a -> m b) -> t a -> m (t b)

Unfortunately for historical reasons the names exported by Foldable quite often conflict with ones defined in the Prelude,
either import them qualified or just disable the Prelude. The operations in the Foldable class all specialize to the same
and behave the same as the ones in Prelude for List types.

import Control.Applicative
import Control.Monad.Identity (runIdentity)
import Data.Foldable
import Data.Monoid
import Data.Traversable
import Prelude hiding (foldr, mapM_)

-- Rose Tree
data Tree a = Node a [Tree a] deriving (Show)

instance Functor Tree where

fmap f (Node x ts) = Node (f x) (fmap (fmap f) ts)

instance Traversable Tree where

traverse f (Node x ts) = Node <$> f x <*> traverse (traverse f) ts

instance Foldable Tree where

foldMap f (Node x ts) = f x `mappend` foldMap (foldMap f) ts

tree :: Tree Integer

tree = Node 1 [Node 1 [], Node 2 [], Node 3 []]

example1 :: IO ()
example1 = mapM_ print tree

example2 :: Integer
example2 = foldr (+) 0 tree

example3 :: Maybe (Tree Integer)

example3 = traverse (\x -> if x > 2 then Just x else Nothing) tree

example4 :: Tree Integer

example4 = runIdentity $ traverse (\x -> pure (x + 1)) tree

The instances we defined above can also be automatically derived by GHC using several language extensions. The
automatic instances are identical to the hand­written versions above.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFoldable #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DeriveTraversable #-}
145 PRELUDE

data Tree a = Node a [Tree a]

deriving (Show, Functor, Foldable, Traversable)
PRELUDE 146
Chapter 8

Strings

The string situation in Haskell is a sad affair. The default String type is defined as linked list of pointers to characters
which is an extremely pathological and inefficient way of representing textual data. Unfortunately for historical reasons
large portions of GHC and Base depend on String.
The String problem is intrinsically linked to the fact that the default GHC Prelude provides a set of broken defaults
that are difficult to change because GHC and the entire ecosystem historically depend on it. There are however high
performance string libraries that can swapped in for the broken String type and we will discuss some ways of working
with high­performance and memory efficient replacements.

String
The default Haskell string type is implemented as a naive linked list of characters, this is hilariously terrible for most
purposes but no one knows how to fix it without rewriting large portions of all code that exists, and simply nobody
wants to commit the time to fix it. So it remains broken, likely forever.

type String = [Char]

However, fear not as there are are two replacement libraries for processing textual data: text and bytestring .
• text ­ Used for handling unicode data.
• bytestring ­ Used for handling ASCII data that needs to interchange with C code or network protocols.
For each of these there are two variants for both text and bytestring.
• lazy ­ Lazy text objects are encoded as lazy lists of strict chunks of bytes.
• strict ­ Byte vectors are encoded as strict Word8 arrays of bytes or code points
Giving rise to the Cartesian product of the four common string types:

Variant Module
strict text ‘Da ta.Text‘
lazy text ‘Da ta.Text.Lazy‘
strict bytestring ‘Da ta.ByteString‘
lazy bytestring ‘Da ta.ByteString.Lazy‘

147
STRINGS 148

String Conversions
Conversions between strings types are done with several functions across the bytestring and text libraries. The mapping
between text and bytestring is inherently lossy so there is some degree of freedom in choosing the encoding. We’ll just
consider utf­8 for simplicity.
(From : left column, To : top row) Data.Text Data.Text.Lazy Data.ByteString Data.ByteString.Lazy ——————
— ——— ————– ————— —————— Data.Text id fromStrict encodeUtf8 encodeUtf8 Data.Text.Lazy
toStrict id encodeUtf8 encodeUtf8 Data.ByteString decodeUtf8 decodeUtf8 id fromStrict Data.ByteString.Lazy de­
codeUtf8 decodeUtf8 toStrict id
Be careful with the functions ( decodeUtf8 , decodeUtf16LE , etc.) as they are partial and will throw errors if the byte
array given does not contain unicode code points. Instead use one of the following functions which will allow you to
explicitly handle the error case:

decodeUtf8' :: ByteString -> Either UnicodeException Text

decodeUtf8With :: OnDecodeError -> ByteString -> Text

OverloadedStrings
With the -XOverloadedStrings extension string literals can be overloaded without the need for explicit packing and
can be written as string literals in the Haskell source and overloaded via the typeclass IsString . Sometimes this is
desirable.

class IsString a where

fromString :: String -> a

For instance:

λ: :type "foo"
"foo" :: [Char]

λ: :set -XOverloadedStrings

λ: :type "foo"
"foo" :: IsString a => a

We can also derive IsString for newtypes using GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving , although much of the safety of the
newtype is then lost if it is used interchangeable with other strings.

newtype Cat = Cat Text

deriving (IsString)

fluffy :: Cat
fluffy = "Fluffy"

Import Conventions
Since there are so many modules that provide string datatypes, and these modules are used ubiquitously, some conventions
are often adopted to import these modules as specific agreed­upon qualified names. In many Haskell projects you will
see the following social conventions used for distinguish text types.
149 STRINGS

For datatypes:

import qualified Data.Text as T

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy as TL
import qualified Data.ByteString as BS
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL
import qualified Data.ByteString.Char8 as C
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy.Char8 as CL

For IO operations:

import qualified Data.Text.IO as TIO

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as TLIO

For encoding operations:

import qualified Data.Text.Encoding as TE

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.Encoding as TLE

In addition many libraries and alternative preludes will define the following type synonyms:

type LText = TL.Text

type LByteString = BL.ByteString

Text
The Text type is a packed blob of Unicode characters.

pack :: String -> Text

unpack :: Text -> String

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import qualified Data.Text as T

-- From pack
myTStr1 :: T.Text
myTStr1 = T.pack ("foo" :: String)

-- From overloaded string literal.

myTStr2 :: T.Text
myTStr2 = "bar"

See: Text
STRINGS 150

Text.Builder

toLazyText :: Builder -> Data.Text.Lazy.Internal.Text

fromLazyText :: Data.Text.Lazy.Internal.Text -> Builder

The Text.Builder allows the efficient monoidal construction of lazy Text types without having to go through inefficient
forms like String or List types as intermediates.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Data.Monoid (mconcat, (<>))

import Data.Text.Lazy.Builder (Builder, toLazyText)

import Data.Text.Lazy.Builder.Int (decimal)
import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as L

beer :: Int -> Builder

beer n = decimal n <> " bottles of beer on the wall.\n"

wall :: Builder
wall = mconcat $ fmap beer [1..1000]

main :: IO ()
main = L.putStrLn $ toLazyText wall

ByteString
ByteStrings are arrays of unboxed characters with either strict or lazy evaluation.

pack :: String -> ByteString

unpack :: ByteString -> String

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import qualified Data.ByteString as S

import qualified Data.ByteString.Char8 as S8

-- From pack
bstr1 :: S.ByteString
bstr1 = S.pack [102, 111, 111] -- ascii encoding of foo as [Word8]

-- From overloaded string literal.

bstr2 :: S.ByteString
bstr2 = "bar"

Printf
Haskell also has a variadic printf function in the style of C.
151 STRINGS

import Data.Text
import Text.Printf

a :: Int
a = 3

b :: Double
b = 3.14159

c :: String
c = "haskell"

example :: String
example = printf "(%i, %f, %s)" a b c
-- "(3, 3.14159, haskell)"

Overloaded Lists
It is ubiquitous for data structure libraries to expose toList and fromList functions to construct various structures
out of lists. As of GHC 7.8 we now have the ability to overload the list syntax in the surface language with the typeclass
IsList .

class IsList l where

type Item l
fromList :: [Item l] -> l
fromListN :: Int -> [Item l] -> l
toList :: l -> [Item l]

instance IsList [a] where

type Item [a] = a
fromList = id
toList = id

λ: :seti -XOverloadedLists
λ: :type [1,2,3]
[1,2,3] :: (Num (GHC.Exts.Item l), GHC.Exts.IsList l) => l

For example we could write an overloaded list instance for hash tables that simply converts to the hash table using
fromList . Some math libraries that use vector­like structures will use overloaded lists in this fashion.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedLists #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import qualified Data.Map as Map

import GHC.Exts (IsList (..))

instance (Ord k) => IsList (Map.Map k v) where

type Item (Map.Map k v) = (k, v)
fromList = Map.fromList
STRINGS 152

toList = Map.toList

example1 :: Map.Map String Int

example1 = [("a", 1), ("b", 2)]

Regex
regex-tdfa implements POSIX extended regular expressions. These can operate over any of the major string types
and with OverloadedStrings enabled allows you to write well­typed regex expressions as strings.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Data.Text
import Text.Regex.TDFA

-- | Verify url address

url :: Text -> Bool
url input = input =~ urlRegex
where
urlRegex :: Text
urlRegex = "https?:\\/\\/(www\\.)?[-a-zA-Z0-9@:%._\\+~#=]{1,256}\\.[a-zA-Z0-9()]{1,6}\\b([-a-zA-Z0-9()@:%_\

-- | Verify email address

email :: Text -> Bool
email input = input =~ emailRegex
where
emailRegex :: Text
emailRegex = "[a-zA-Z0-9+._-]+@[a-zA-Z-]+\\.[a-z]+"

Escaping Text
Haskell uses C­style single­character escape codes

Escape Unicode Character

\n U+000A newline
\0 U+0000 null character
\& n/a empty string
\’ U+0027 single quote
\\ U+005C backslash
\a U+0007 alert
\b U+0008 backspace
\f U+000C form feed
\r U+000D carriage return
\t U+0009 horizontal tab
\v U+000B vertical tab
\” U+0022 double quote
153 STRINGS

String Splitting
The split package provides a variety of missing functions for splitting list and string types.

import Data.List.Split

example1 :: [String]
example1 = splitOn "." "foo.bar.baz"
-- ["foo","bar","baz"]

example2 :: [String]
example2 = chunksOf 10 "To be or not to be that is the question."
-- ["To be or n","ot to be t","hat is the"," question."]
STRINGS 154
Chapter 9

Applicatives

Like monads Applicatives are an abstract structure for a wide class of computations that sit between functors and monads
in terms of generality.

pure :: Applicative f => a -> f a

(<$>) :: Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b
(<*>) :: f (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

As of GHC 7.6, Applicative is defined as:

class Functor f => Applicative f where

pure :: a -> f a
(<*>) :: f (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

(<$>) :: Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

(<$>) = fmap

With the following laws:

pure id <*> v = v
pure f <*> pure x = pure (f x)
u <*> pure y = pure ($ y) <*> u
u <*> (v <*> w) = pure (.) <*> u <*> v <*> w

As an example, consider the instance for Maybe:

instance Applicative Maybe where

pure = Just
Nothing <*> _ = Nothing
_ <*> Nothing = Nothing
Just f <*> Just x = Just (f x)

As a rule of thumb, whenever we would use m >>= return . f what we probably want is an applicative functor, and
not a monad.

155
APPLICATIVES 156

import Control.Applicative ((<$>), (<*>))

import Network.HTTP

example1 :: Maybe Integer

example1 = (+) <$> m1 <*> m2
where
m1 = Just 3
m2 = Nothing

-- Nothing

example2 :: [(Int, Int, Int)]

example2 = (,,) <$> m1 <*> m2 <*> m3
where
m1 = [1, 2]
m2 = [10, 20]
m3 = [100, 200]

-- [(1,10,100),(1,10,200),(1,20,100),(1,20,200),(2,10,100),(2,10,200),(2,20,100),(2,20,200)]

example3 :: IO String
example3 = (++) <$> fetch1 <*> fetch2
where
fetch1 = simpleHTTP (getRequest "http://www.python.org/") >>= getResponseBody
fetch2 = simpleHTTP (getRequest "http://www.haskell.org/") >>= getResponseBody

The pattern f <$> a <*> b ... shows up so frequently that there is a family of functions to lift applicatives of a fixed
number arguments. This pattern also shows up frequently with monads ( liftM , liftM2 , liftM3 ).

liftA :: Applicative f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

liftA f a = pure f <*> a

liftA2 :: Applicative f => (a -> b -> c) -> f a -> f b -> f c

liftA2 f a b = f <$> a <*> b

liftA3 :: Applicative f => (a -> b -> c -> d) -> f a -> f b -> f c -> f d
liftA3 f a b c = f <$> a <*> b <*> c

Applicative also has functions *> and <* that sequence applicative actions while discarding the value of one of the
arguments. The operator *> discards the left while <* discards the right. For example in a monadic parser combinator
library the *> would parse with first parser argument but return the second.

The Applicative functions <$> and <*> are generalized by liftM and ap for monads.

import Control.Monad
import Control.Applicative

data C a b = C a b

mnd :: Monad m => m a -> m b -> m (C a b)

mnd a b = C `liftM` a `ap` b
157 APPLICATIVES

apl :: Applicative f => f a -> f b -> f (C a b)

apl a b = C <$> a <*> b

See: Applicative Programming with Effects

Alternative
Alternative is an extension of the Applicative class with a zero element and an associative binary operation respecting the
zero.

class Applicative f => Alternative f where

-- | The identity of '<|>'
empty :: f a
-- | An associative binary operation
(<|>) :: f a -> f a -> f a
-- | One or more.
some :: f a -> f [a]
-- | Zero or more.
many :: f a -> f [a]

optional :: Alternative f => f a -> f (Maybe a)

when :: (Alternative f) => Bool -> f () -> f ()

when p s = if p then s else return ()

guard :: (Alternative f) => Bool -> f ()

guard True = pure ()
guard False = mzero

instance Alternative Maybe where

empty = Nothing
Nothing <|> r = r
l <|> _ = l

instance Alternative [] where

empty = []
(<|>) = (++)

λ: foldl1 (<|>) [Nothing, Just 5, Just 3]

Just 5

These instances show up very frequently in parsers where the alternative operator can model alternative parse branches.

Arrows
A category is an algebraic structure that includes a notion of an identity and a composition operation that is associative
and preserves identities. In practice arrows are not often used in modern Haskell and are often considered a code smell.
APPLICATIVES 158

class Category cat where

id :: cat a a
(.) :: cat b c -> cat a b -> cat a c

instance Category (->) where

id = Prelude.id
(.) = (Prelude..)

(<<<) :: Category cat => cat b c -> cat a b -> cat a c

(<<<) = (.)

(>>>) :: Category cat => cat a b -> cat b c -> cat a c

f >>> g = g . f

Arrows are an extension of categories with the notion of products.

class Category a => Arrow a where

arr :: (b -> c) -> a b c
first :: a b c -> a (b,d) (c,d)
second :: a b c -> a (d,b) (d,c)
(***) :: a b c -> a b' c' -> a (b,b') (c,c')
(&&&) :: a b c -> a b c' -> a b (c,c')

The canonical example is for functions.

instance Arrow (->) where

arr f = f
first f = f *** id
second f = id *** f
(***) f g ~(x,y) = (f x, g y)

In this form, functions of multiple arguments can be threaded around using the arrow combinators in a much more
pointfree form. For instance a histogram function has a nice one­liner.

import Data.List (group, sort)

histogram :: Ord a => [a] -> [(a, Int)]

histogram = map (head &&& length) . group . sort

λ: histogram "Hello world"

[(' ',1),('H',1),('d',1),('e',1),('l',3),('o',2),('r',1),('w',1)]

Arrow notation

GHC has builtin syntax for composing arrows using proc notation. The following are equivalent after desugaring:
159 APPLICATIVES

{-# LANGUAGE Arrows #-}

addA :: Arrow a => a b Int -> a b Int -> a b Int

addA f g = proc x -> do
y <- f -< x
z <- g -< x
returnA -< y + z

addA f g = arr (\ x -> (x, x)) >>>

first f >>> arr (\ (y, x) -> (x, y)) >>>
first g >>> arr (\ (z, y) -> y + z)

addA f g = f &&& g >>> arr (\ (y, z) -> y + z)

In practice this notation is not often used and may become deprecated in the future.
See: Arrow Notation

Bifunctors
Bifunctors are a generalization of functors to include types parameterized by two parameters and include two map func­
tions for each parameter.

class Bifunctor p where

bimap :: (a -> b) -> (c -> d) -> p a c -> p b d
first :: (a -> b) -> p a c -> p b c
second :: (b -> c) -> p a b -> p a c

The bifunctor laws are a natural generalization of the usual functor laws. Namely they respect identities and composition
in the usual way:

bimap id id ≡ id
first id ≡ id
second id ≡ id

bimap f g ≡ first f . second g

The canonical example is for 2­tuples.

λ: first (+1) (1,2)

(2,2)
λ: second (+1) (1,2)
(1,3)
λ: bimap (+1) (+1) (1,2)
(2,3)

λ: first (+1) (Left 3)

APPLICATIVES 160

Left 4
λ: second (+1) (Left 3)
Left 3
λ: second (+1) (Right 3)
Right 4

Polyvariadic Functions
One surprising application of typeclasses is the ability to construct functions which take an arbitrary number of arguments
by defining instances over function types. The arguments may be of arbitrary type, but the resulting collected arguments
must either be converted into a single type or unpacked into a sum type.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

class Arg a where

collect' :: [String] -> a

-- extract to IO
instance Arg (IO ()) where
collect' acc = mapM_ putStrLn acc

-- extract to [String]
instance Arg [String] where
collect' acc = acc

instance (Show a, Arg r) => Arg (a -> r) where

collect' acc = \x -> collect' (acc ++ [show x])

collect :: Arg t => t

collect = collect' []

example1 :: [String]
example1 = collect 'a' 2 3.0

example2 :: IO ()
example2 = collect () "foo" [1,2,3]
Chapter 10

Error Handling

There are a plethora of ways of handling errors in Haskell. While Haskell’s runtime supports throwing and handling
exceptions, it is important to use the right method in the right context.

Either Monad
In keeping with the Haskell tradition it is always preferable to use pure logic when possible. In many simple cases error
handling can be done quite simply by using the Monad instance of Either. Monadic bind simply threads a Right value
through the monad and “short­circuits” evaluation when a Left is introduced. This is simple enough error handling
which privileges the Left constructor to hold the error. Many simple functions which can fail can simply use the
Either Error a in the result type to encode simple error handling.

The downside to this is that it forces every consumer of the function to pattern match on the result to handle the error
case. It also assumes that all Error types can be encoded inside of the sum type holding the possible failures.

saveDiv -> Float -> Float -> Either DivError Float

safeDiv x 0 = Left NoDivZero
safeDiv x y = Right (x `div` y)

ExceptT
When using the transformers style effect stacks it is quite common to need to have a layer of the stack which can
fail. When using the style of composing effects a monad transformer (which is a wrapper around Either monad) can be
added which lifts the error handling into an ExceptT effect layer.

As of mtl 2.2 or higher, the ErrorT class has been replaced by ExceptT at the transformers level.

newtype ExceptT e m a = ExceptT (m (Either e a))

runExceptT :: ExceptT e m a -> m (Either e a)

runExceptT (ExceptT m) = m

instance (Monad m) => Monad (ExceptT e m) where

return a = ExceptT $ return (Right a)
m >>= k = ExceptT $ do

161
ERROR HANDLING 162

a <- runExceptT m
case a of
Left e -> return (Left e)
Right x -> runExceptT (k x)
fail = ExceptT . fail

throwE :: (Monad m) => e -> ExceptT e m a

throwE = ExceptT . return . Left

catchE :: (Monad m) =>

ExceptT e m a -- ^ the inner computation
-> (e -> ExceptT e' m a) -- ^ a handler for exceptions in the inner
-- computation
-> ExceptT e' m a
m `catchE` h = ExceptT $ do
a <- runExceptT m
case a of
Left l -> runExceptT (h l)
Right r -> return (Right r)

And also this can be extended to the mtl MonadError instance for which we can write instances for IO and Either
themselves:

instance MonadTrans (ExceptT e) where

lift = ExceptT . liftM Right

class (Monad m) => MonadError e m | m -> e where

throwError :: e -> m a
catchError :: m a -> (e -> m a) -> m a

instance MonadError IOException IO where

throwError = ioError
catchError = catch

instance MonadError e (Either e) where

throwError = Left
Left l `catchError` h = h l
Right r `catchError` _ = Right r

See:

• Control.Monad.Except

Control.Exception
GHC has a builtin system for propagating errors up at the runtime level, below the business logic level. These are used
internally for all sorts of concurrency and system interfaces. The runtime provides builtin operations throw and catch
functions which allow us to throw exceptions in pure code and catch the resulting exception within IO. Note that the
return value of throw inhabits all types.
163 ERROR HANDLING

throw :: Exception e => e -> a

catch :: Exception e => IO a -> (e -> IO a) -> IO a
try :: Exception e => IO a -> IO (Either e a)
evaluate :: a -> IO a

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

import Data.Typeable
import Control.Exception

data MyException = MyException

deriving (Show, Typeable)

instance Exception MyException

evil :: [Int]
evil = [throw MyException]

example1 :: Int
example1 = head evil

example2 :: Int
example2 = length evil

main :: IO ()
main = do
a <- try (evaluate example1) :: IO (Either MyException Int)
print a

b <- try (return example2) :: IO (Either MyException Int)

print b

Because a value will not be evaluated unless needed, if one desires to know for sure that an exception is either caught or
not it can be deeply forced into head normal form before invoking catch. The strictCatch is not provided by the
standard library but has a simple implementation in terms of deepseq .

strictCatch :: (NFData a, Exception e) => IO a -> (e -> IO a) -> IO a

strictCatch = catch . (toNF =<<)

Exceptions
The problem with the previous approach is having to rely on GHC’s asynchronous exception handling inside of IO to
handle basic operations and the bifurcation of APIs which need to expose different APIs for any monad that has failure
( IO , STM , ExceptT , etc.).

The exceptions package provides the same API as Control.Exception but loosens the dependency on IO. It instead
provides a granular set of typeclasses which can operate over different monads which require a precise subset of error
handling methods.
• MonadThrow ­ Monads which expose an interface for throwing exceptions.
• MonadCatch ­ Monads which expose an interface for handling exceptions.
ERROR HANDLING 164

• MonadMask ­ Monads which expose an interface for masking asynchronous exceptions.

There are three core primitives that are used in handling runtime exceptions:
• finally ­ For handling guaranteed finalisation of code in the presence of exceptions.
• onException ­ For handing exception case only if an exception is thrown.
• bracket ­ For implementing resource handling with custom acquisition and finalizer logic, in the presence of
exceptions.
finally takes an IO action to run as a computation and a secondary function to run after the evaluation of the first.

finally :: IO a -- ^ computation to run first

-> IO b -- ^ computation to run afterward (even if an exception was raised)
-> IO a -- returns the value from the first computation

onException has a similar signature but the second function is run only if an exception is raised.

onException :: IO a -> IO b -> IO a

The bracket function takes two functions, an acquisition function and a finalizer function which “bracket” the evalu­
ation of the third. The finaliser will be run if the computation throwns an exception and unwinds.

bracket
:: IO a -- ^ computation to run first
-> (a -> IO b) -- ^ computation to run last
-> (a -> IO c) -- ^ computation to run in-between
-> IO c -- returns the value from the in-between computation

A simple example of usage is bracket logic that handles file descriptors which need to be explicitly closed after evaluation
is done. The initialiser in this case will return a file descriptor to the body and then run hClose on the file descriptor
after the body is done with evaluation.

bracket
(openFile "myfile" ReadMode) -- acquisition
(hClose) -- finaliser
(\fileHandle -> ... ) -- body

In addition the exceptions library exposes several functions for explicitly handling a variety of exceptions of various
forms. Toplevel handlers that need to “catch em’ all” should use catchAny for wildcard error handling.

catch :: (MonadCatch m, Exception e) => m a -> (e -> m a) -> m a

catchIO :: MonadCatch m => m a -> (IOException -> m a) -> m a
catchAny :: MonadCatch m => m a -> (SomeException -> m a) -> m a
catchAsync :: (MonadCatch m, Exception e) => m a -> (e -> m a) -> m a

A simple example of usage:

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

import Data.Typeable
import Control.Monad.Catch
165 ERROR HANDLING

import Control.Monad.Identity

data MyException = MyException

deriving (Show, Typeable)

instance Exception MyException

example :: MonadCatch m => Int -> Int -> m Int

example x y | y == 0 = throwM MyException
| otherwise = return $ x `div` y

pure :: MonadCatch m => m (Either MyException Int)

pure = do
a <- try (example 1 2)
b <- try (example 1 0)
return (a >> b)

See: exceptions

Spoon
Sometimes you’ll be forced to deal with seemingly pure functions that can throw up at any point. There are many
functions in the standard library like this, and many more on Hackage. You’d like to handle this logic purely as if it were
returning a proper Maybe a but to catch the logic you’d need to install an IO handler inside IO to catch it. Spoon
allows us to safely (and “purely”, although it uses a referentially transparent invocation of unsafePerformIO) to catch
these exceptions and put them in Maybe where they belong.
The spoon function evaluates its argument to head normal form, while teaspoon evaluates to weak head normal
form.

import Control.Spoon

goBoom :: Int -> Int -> Int

goBoom x y = x `div` y

-- evaluate to normal form

test1 :: Maybe [Int]
test1 = spoon [1, 2, undefined]

-- evaluate to weak head normal form

test2 :: Maybe [Int]
test2 = teaspoon [1, 2, undefined]

main :: IO ()
main = do
maybe (putStrLn "Nothing") (print . length) test1
maybe (putStrLn "Nothing") (print . length) test2
ERROR HANDLING 166
Chapter 11

Advanced Monads

When working with the wider library you will find there a variety of “advanced monads” which are higher­level construc­
tions on top of of the monadic interface which enrich the structure with additional rules or build APIs for combining
different types of monads. Some of the most­used cases are mentioned in this section.

Function Monad
If one writes Haskell long enough one might eventually encounter the curious beast that is the ((->) r) monad
instance. It generally tends to be non­intuitive to work with, but is quite simple when one considers it as an unwrapped
Reader monad.

instance Functor ((->) r) where

fmap = (.)

instance Monad ((->) r) where

return = const
f >>= k = \r -> k (f r) r

This just uses a prefix form of the arrow type operator.

import Control.Monad

id' :: (->) a a
id' = id

const' :: (->) a ((->) b a)

const' = const

-- Monad m => a -> m a

fret :: a -> b -> a
fret = return

-- Monad m => m a -> (a -> m b) -> m b

fbind :: (r -> a) -> (a -> (r -> b)) -> (r -> b)
fbind f k = f >>= k

-- Monad m => m (m a) -> m a

167
ADVANCED MONADS 168

fjoin :: (r -> (r -> a)) -> (r -> a)

fjoin = join

fid :: a -> a
fid = const >>= id

-- Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

fcompose :: (a -> b) -> (r -> a) -> (r -> b)
fcompose = (.)

type Reader r = (->) r -- pseudocode

instance Monad (Reader r) where

return a = \_ -> a
f >>= k = \r -> k (f r) r

ask' :: r -> r
ask' = id

asks' :: (r -> a) -> (r -> a)

asks' f = id . f

runReader' :: (r -> a) -> r -> a

runReader' = id

RWS Monad
The RWS monad combines the functionality of the three monads discussed above, the Reader, Writer, and State. There
is also a RWST transformer.

runReader :: Reader r a -> r -> a

runWriter :: Writer w a -> (a, w)
runState :: State s a -> s -> (a, s)

These three eval functions are now combined into the following functions:

runRWS :: RWS r w s a -> r -> s -> (a, s, w)

execRWS :: RWS r w s a -> r -> s -> (s, w)
evalRWS :: RWS r w s a -> r -> s -> (a, w)

import Control.Monad.RWS

type R = Int
type W = [Int]
type S = Int

computation :: RWS R W S ()
computation = do
169 ADVANCED MONADS

e <- ask
a <- get
let b = a + e
put b
tell [b]

example = runRWS computation 2 3

The usual caveat about Writer laziness also applies to RWS.

Cont

runCont :: Cont r a -> (a -> r) -> r

callCC :: MonadCont m => ((a -> m b) -> m a) -> m a
cont :: ((a -> r) -> r) -> Cont r a

In continuation passing style, composite computations are built up from sequences of nested computations which are
terminated by a final continuation which yields the result of the full computation by passing a function into the contin­
uation chain.

add :: Int -> Int -> Int

add x y = x + y

add :: Int -> Int -> (Int -> r) -> r

add x y k = k (x + y)

import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.Cont

add :: Int -> Int -> Cont k Int

add x y = return $ x + y

mult :: Int -> Int -> Cont k Int

mult x y = return $ x * y

contt :: ContT () IO ()
contt = do
k <- do
callCC $ \exit -> do
lift $ putStrLn "Entry"
exit $ \_ -> do
putStrLn "Exit"
lift $ putStrLn "Inside"
lift $ k ()

callcc :: Cont String Integer

callcc = do
a <- return 1
b <- callCC (\k -> k 2)
ADVANCED MONADS 170

return $ a+b

ex1 :: IO ()
ex1 = print $ runCont (f >>= g) id
where
f = add 1 2
g = mult 3
-- 9

ex2 :: IO ()
ex2 = print $ runCont callcc show
-- "3"

ex3 :: IO ()
ex3 = runContT contt print
-- Entry
-- Inside
-- Exit

main :: IO ()
main = do
ex1
ex2
ex3

newtype Cont r a = Cont { runCont :: ((a -> r) -> r) }

instance Monad (Cont r) where

return a = Cont $ \k -> k a
(Cont c) >>= f = Cont $ \k -> c (\a -> runCont (f a) k)

class (Monad m) => MonadCont m where

callCC :: ((a -> m b) -> m a) -> m a

instance MonadCont (Cont r) where

callCC f = Cont $ \k -> runCont (f (\a -> Cont $ \_ -> k a)) k

• MonadCont Under the Hood

MonadPlus
Choice and failure.

class (Alternative m, Monad m) => MonadPlus m where

mzero :: m a
mplus :: m a -> m a -> m a

instance MonadPlus [] where

mzero = []
mplus = (++)
171 ADVANCED MONADS

instance MonadPlus Maybe where

mzero = Nothing

Nothing `mplus` ys = ys
xs `mplus` _ys = xs

MonadPlus forms a monoid with

mzero `mplus` a = a
a `mplus` mzero = a
(a `mplus` b) `mplus` c = a `mplus` (b `mplus` c)

asum :: (Foldable t, Alternative f) => t (f a) -> f a

asum = foldr (<|>) empty

msum :: (Foldable t, MonadPlus m) => t (m a) -> m a

msum = asum

import Safe
import Control.Monad

list1 :: [(Int,Int)]
list1 = [(a,b) | a <- [1..25], b <- [1..25], a < b]

list2 :: [(Int,Int)]
list2 = do
a <- [1..25]
b <- [1..25]
guard (a < b)
return $ (a,b)

maybe1 :: String -> String -> Maybe Double

maybe1 a b = do
a' <- readMay a
b' <- readMay b
guard (b' /= 0.0)
return $ a'/b'

maybe2 :: Maybe Int

maybe2 = msum [Nothing, Nothing, Just 3, Just 4]

MonadFail
Before the great awakening, Monads used to be defined as the following class.

class Monad m where

(>>=) :: m a -> (a -> m b) -> m b
(>>) :: m a -> m b -> m b
ADVANCED MONADS 172

return :: a -> m a
fail :: String -> m a

m >> k = m >>= \_ -> k

fail s = error s

This was eventually deemed not to be an great design and in particular the fail function was a misplaced lawless entity
that would generate bottoms. It was also necessary to define fail for all monads, even those without a notion of
failure. This was considered quite ugly and eventually a breaking change to base (landed in 4.9) was added which split
out MonadFail into a separate class where it belonged.

class Monad m => MonadFail m where

fail :: String -> m a

Some of the common instances of MonadFail are shown below:

instance MonadFail Maybe where

fail _ = Nothing

instance MonadFail [] where

{-# INLINE fail #-}
fail _ = []

instance MonadFail IO where

fail = failIO

MonadFix
The fixed point of a monadic computation. mfix f executes the action f only once, with the eventual output fed
back as the input.

fix :: (a -> a) -> a

fix f = let x = f x in x

mfix :: (a -> m a) -> m a

class Monad m => MonadFix m where

mfix :: (a -> m a) -> m a

instance MonadFix Maybe where

mfix f = let a = f (unJust a) in a
where unJust (Just x) = x
unJust Nothing = error "mfix Maybe: Nothing"

The regular do­notation can also be extended with -XRecursiveDo to accommodate recursive monadic bindings.

{-# LANGUAGE RecursiveDo #-}

173 ADVANCED MONADS

import Control.Applicative
import Control.Monad.Fix

stream1 :: Maybe [Int]

stream1 = do
rec xs <- Just (1:xs)
return (map negate xs)

stream2 :: Maybe [Int]

stream2 = mfix $ \xs -> do
xs' <- Just (1:xs)
return (map negate xs')

ST Monad
The ST monad models “threads” of stateful computations which can manipulate mutable references but are restricted to
only return pure values when evaluated and are statically confined to the ST monad of a s thread.

runST :: (forall s. ST s a) -> a

newSTRef :: a -> ST s (STRef s a)
readSTRef :: STRef s a -> ST s a
writeSTRef :: STRef s a -> a -> ST s ()

import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.ST
import Control.Monad.State.Strict
import Data.STRef

example1 :: Int
example1 = runST $ do
x <- newSTRef 0
forM_ [1 .. 1000] $ \j -> do
writeSTRef x j
readSTRef x

example2 :: Int
example2 = runST $ do
count <- newSTRef 0
replicateM_ (10 ^ 6) $ modifySTRef' count (+ 1)
readSTRef count

example3 :: Int
example3 = flip evalState 0 $ do
replicateM_ (10 ^ 6) $ modify' (+ 1)
get

Using the ST monad we can create a class of efficient purely functional data structures that use mutable references in a
referentially transparent way.
ADVANCED MONADS 174

Free Monads
Pure :: a -> Free f a
Free :: f (Free f a) -> Free f a

liftF :: (Functor f, MonadFree f m) => f a -> m a

retract :: Monad f => Free f a -> f a

Free monads are monads which instead of having a join operation that combines computations, instead forms com­
posite computations from application of a functor.

join :: Monad m => m (m a) -> m a

wrap :: MonadFree f m => f (m a) -> m a

One of the best examples is the Partiality monad which models computations which can diverge. Haskell allows un­
bounded recursion, but for example we can create a free monad from the Maybe functor which can be used to fix the
call­depth of, for example the Ackermann function.

import Control.Monad.Fix
import Control.Monad.Free

type Partiality a = Free Maybe a

-- Non-termination.
never :: Partiality a
never = fix (Free . Just)

fromMaybe :: Maybe a -> Partiality a

fromMaybe (Just x) = Pure x
fromMaybe Nothing = Free Nothing

runPartiality :: Int -> Partiality a -> Maybe a

runPartiality 0 _ = Nothing
runPartiality _ (Pure a) = Just a
runPartiality _ (Free Nothing) = Nothing
runPartiality n (Free (Just a)) = runPartiality (n-1) a

ack :: Int -> Int -> Partiality Int

ack 0 n = Pure $ n + 1
ack m 0 = Free $ Just $ ack (m-1) 1
ack m n = Free $ Just $ ack m (n-1) >>= ack (m-1)

main :: IO ()
main = do
let diverge = never :: Partiality ()
print $ runPartiality 1000 diverge
print $ runPartiality 1000 (ack 3 4)
print $ runPartiality 5500 (ack 3 4)

The other common use for free monads is to build embedded domain­specific languages to describe computations. We
can model a subset of the IO monad by building up a pure description of the computation inside of the IOFree monad
and then using the free monad to encode the translation to an effectful IO computation.
175 ADVANCED MONADS

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

import Control.Monad.Free
import System.Exit

data Interaction x
= Puts String x
| Gets (Char -> x)
| Exit
deriving (Functor)

type IOFree a = Free Interaction a

puts :: String -> IOFree ()

puts s = liftF $ Puts s ()

get :: IOFree Char

get = liftF $ Gets id

exit :: IOFree r
exit = liftF Exit

gets :: IOFree String

gets = do
c <- get
if c == '\n'
then return ""
else gets >>= \line -> return (c : line)

-- Collapse our IOFree DSL into IO monad actions.

interp :: IOFree a -> IO a
interp (Pure r) = return r
interp (Free x) = case x of
Puts s t -> putStrLn s >> interp t
Gets f -> getChar >>= interp . f
Exit -> exitSuccess

echo :: IOFree ()
echo = do
puts "Enter your name:"
str <- gets
puts str
if length str > 10
then puts "You have a long name."
else puts "You have a short name."
exit

main :: IO ()
main = interp echo

An implementation such as the one found in free might look like the following:
ADVANCED MONADS 176

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

data Free f a
= Pure a
| Free (f (Free f a))

instance Functor f => Functor (Free f) where

fmap f (Pure a) = Pure (f a)
fmap f x = go x
where
go (Free fa) = Free (go <$> fa)

instance Applicative f => Applicative (Free f) where

pure = Pure
Pure a <*> Pure b = Pure $ a b
Pure a <*> Free mb = Free $ fmap a <$> mb
Free ma <*> Pure b = Free $ fmap ($ b) <$> ma
Free ma <*> Free mb = Free $ fmap (<*>) ma <*> mb

instance Applicative f => Monad (Free f) where

return = Pure
Pure a >>= f = f a
Free f >>= g = Free (fmap (>>= g) f)

class Monad m => MonadFree f m where

wrap :: f (m a) -> m a

instance Applicative f => MonadFree f (Free f) where

wrap = Free

liftF :: (Functor f, MonadFree f m) => f a -> m a

liftF = wrap . fmap return

iter :: Functor f => (f a -> a) -> Free f a -> a

iter _ (Pure a) = a
iter phi (Free m) = phi (iter phi <$> m)

retract :: Monad f => Free f a -> f a

retract (Pure a) = return a
retract (Free as) = as >>= retract

Indexed Monads
Indexed monads are a generalisation of monads that adds an additional type parameter to the class that carries information
about the computation or structure of the monadic implementation.

class IxMonad md where

return :: a -> md i i a
(>>=) :: md i m a -> (a -> md m o b) -> md i o b
177 ADVANCED MONADS

The canonical use­case is a variant of the vanilla State which allows type­changing on the state for intermediate steps inside
of the monad. This indeed turns out to be very useful for handling a class of problems involving resource management
since the extra index parameter gives us space to statically enforce the sequence of monadic actions by allowing and
restricting certain state transitions on the index parameter at compile­time.

To make this more usable we’ll use the somewhat esoteric -XRebindableSyntax allowing us to overload the do­notation
and if­then­else syntax by providing alternative definitions local to the module.

{-# LANGUAGE RebindableSyntax #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}
{-# LANGUAGE NoMonomorphismRestriction #-}

import Data.IORef
import Data.Char
import Prelude hiding (fmap, (>>=), (>>), return)
import Control.Applicative

newtype IState i o a = IState { runIState :: i -> (a, o) }

evalIState :: IState i o a -> i -> a

evalIState st i = fst $ runIState st i

execIState :: IState i o a -> i -> o

execIState st i = snd $ runIState st i

ifThenElse :: Bool -> a -> a -> a

ifThenElse b i j = case b of
True -> i
False -> j

return :: a -> IState s s a

return a = IState $ \s -> (a, s)

fmap :: (a -> b) -> IState i o a -> IState i o b

fmap f v = IState $ \i -> let (a, o) = runIState v i
in (f a, o)

join :: IState i m (IState m o a) -> IState i o a

join v = IState $ \i -> let (w, m) = runIState v i
in runIState w m

(>>=) :: IState i m a -> (a -> IState m o b) -> IState i o b

v >>= f = IState $ \i -> let (a, m) = runIState v i
in runIState (f a) m

(>>) :: IState i m a -> IState m o b -> IState i o b

v >> w = v >>= \_ -> w

get :: IState s s s
get = IState $ \s -> (s, s)

gets :: (a -> o) -> IState a o a

gets f = IState $ \s -> (s, f s)
ADVANCED MONADS 178

put :: o -> IState i o ()

put o = IState $ \_ -> ((), o)

modify :: (i -> o) -> IState i o ()

modify f = IState $ \i -> ((), f i)

data Locked = Locked

data Unlocked = Unlocked

type Stateful a = IState a Unlocked a

acquire :: IState i Locked ()

acquire = put Locked

-- Can only release the lock if it's held, try release the lock
-- that's not held is a now a type error.
release :: IState Locked Unlocked ()
release = put Unlocked

-- Statically forbids improper handling of resources.

lockExample :: Stateful a
lockExample = do
ptr <- get :: IState a a a
acquire :: IState a Locked ()
-- ...
release :: IState Locked Unlocked ()
return ptr

-- Couldn't match type `Locked' with `Unlocked'

-- In a stmt of a 'do' block: return ptr
failure1 :: Stateful a
failure1 = do
ptr <- get
acquire
return ptr -- didn't release

-- Couldn't match type `a' with `Locked'

-- In a stmt of a 'do' block: release
failure2 :: Stateful a
failure2 = do
ptr <- get
release -- didn't acquire
return ptr

-- Evaluate the resulting state, statically ensuring that the

-- lock is released when finished.
evalReleased :: IState i Unlocked a -> i -> a
evalReleased f st = evalIState f st

example :: IO (IORef Integer)

example = evalReleased <$> pure lockExample <*> newIORef 0
179 ADVANCED MONADS

Lifted Base
The default prelude predates a lot of the work on monad transformers and as such many of the common functions for
handling errors and interacting with IO are bound strictly to the IO monad and not to functions implementing stacks
on top of IO or ST. The lifted­base provides generic control operations such as catch can be lifted from IO or any
other base monad.

monad­base
Monad base provides an abstraction over liftIO and other functions to explicitly lift into a “privileged” layer of the
transformer stack. It’s implemented as a multiparameter typeclass with the “base” monad as the parameter b.

-- | Lift a computation from the base monad

class (Applicative b, Applicative m, Monad b, Monad m)
=> MonadBase b m | m -> b where
liftBase ∷ b a -> m a

monad­control
Monad control builds on top of monad­base to extended lifting operation to control operations like catch and
bracket can be written generically in terms of any transformer with a base layer supporting these operations. Generic
operations can then be expressed in terms of a MonadBaseControl and written in terms of the combinator control
which handles the bracket and automatic handler lifting.

control :: MonadBaseControl b m => (RunInBase m b -> b (StM m a)) -> m a

For example the function catch provided by Control.Exception is normally locked into IO.
catch :: Exception e => IO a -> (e -> IO a) -> IO a

By composing it in terms of control we can construct a generic version which automatically lifts inside of any combination
of the usual transformer stacks that has MonadBaseControl instance.

catch
:: (MonadBaseControl IO m, Exception e)
=> m a -- ^ Computation
-> (e -> m a) -- ^ Handler
-> m a
catch a handler = control $ \runInIO ->
E.catch (runInIO a)
(\e -> runInIO $ handler e)
ADVANCED MONADS 180
Chapter 12

Quantification

In logic a predicate is a statement about a subject. For instance the statement: Socrates is a man, can be written as:
Man(Socrates)

A predicate assigned to a variable Man(x) has a truth value if the predicate holds for the subject. The domain of a variable
is the set of all variables that may be assigned to the variable. A quantifier turns predicates into propositions by assigning
values to all variables. For example the statement: All men are mortal. This is an example of a universal quantifier which
describe a predicate that holds forall inhabitants of the domain of variables.
Forall x. If Man(x) then Mortal(x)

The truth value that that Socrates is mortal can be derived from above relation. Programming with quantifiers in Haskell
follows this same kind of logical convention except we will be working with types and constraints on types.

Universal Quantification
Universal quantification the primary mechanism of encoding polymorphism in Haskell. The essence of universal quan­
tification is that we can express functions which operate the same way for a set of types and whose function behavior
is entirely determined only by the behavior of all types in this span. These are represented at the type­level by in the
introduction of a universal quantifier ( forall or ∀ ) over a set of the type variables in the signature.

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

-- ∀a. [a]
example1 :: forall a. [a]
example1 = []

-- ∀a. [a]
example2 :: forall a. [a]
example2 = [undefined]

-- ∀a. ∀b. (a → b) → [a] → [b]

map' :: forall a. forall b. (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map' f = foldr ((:) . f) []

-- ∀a. [a] → [a]

reverse' :: forall a. [a] -> [a]
reverse' = foldl (flip (:)) []

181
QUANTIFICATION 182

Normally quantifiers are omitted in type signatures since in Haskell’s vanilla surface language it is unambiguous to assume
to that free type variables are universally quantified. So the following two are equivalent:

id :: forall a. a -> a
id :: a -> a

Free Theorems
A universally quantified type­variable actually implies quite a few rather deep properties about the implementation of a
function that can be deduced from its type signature. For instance the identity function in Haskell is guaranteed to only
have one implementation since the only information that the information that can present in the body:

id :: forall a. a -> a
id x = x

These so called free theorems are properties that hold for any well­typed inhabitant of a universally quantified signature.

fmap :: Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

For example a free theorem of fmap is that every implementation of functor can only ever have the property that com­
position of maps of functions is the same as maps of the functions composed together.

forall f g. fmap f . fmap g = fmap (f . g)

Type Systems
Hindley­Milner type system
The Hindley­Milner type system is historically important as one of the first typed lambda calculi that admitted both
polymorphism and a variety of inference techniques that could always decide principal types.

e : x
| λx:t.e -- value abstraction
| e1 e2 -- application
| let x = e1 in e2 -- let

t : t -> t -- function types

| a -- type variables

σ : ∀ a . t -- type scheme

In an type checker implementation, a generalize function converts all type variables within the type into polymorphic
type variables yielding a type scheme. While a instantiate function maps a scheme to a type, but with any polymorphic
variables converted into unbound type variables.

Rank­N Types
System­F is the type system that underlies Haskell. System­F subsumes the HM type system in the sense that every type
expressible in HM can be expressed within System­F. System­F is sometimes referred to in texts as the Girald­Reynolds
183 QUANTIFICATION

polymorphic lambda calculus or second­order lambda calculus.

t : t -> t -- function types

| a -- type variables
| ∀ a . t -- forall

e : x -- variables
| λ(x:t).e -- value abstraction
| e1 e2 -- value application
| Λa.e -- type abstraction
| e_t -- type application

An example with equivalents of GHC Core in comments:

id : ∀ t. t -> t
id = Λt. λx:t. x
-- id :: forall t. t -> t
-- id = \ (@ t) (x :: t) -> x

tr : ∀ a. ∀ b. a -> b -> a
tr = Λa. Λb. λx:a. λy:b. x
-- tr :: forall a b. a -> b -> a
-- tr = \ (@ a) (@ b) (x :: a) (y :: b) -> x

fl : ∀ a. ∀ b. a -> b -> b
fl = Λa. Λb. λx:a. λy:b. y
-- fl :: forall a b. a -> b -> b
-- fl = \ (@ a) (@ b) (x :: a) (y :: b) -> y

nil : ∀ a. [a]
nil = Λa. Λb. λz:b. λf:(a -> b -> b). z
-- nil :: forall a. [a]
-- nil = \ (@ a) (@ b) (z :: b) (f :: a -> b -> b) -> z

cons : ∀ a. a -> [a] -> [a]

cons = Λa. λx:a. λxs:(∀ b. b -> (a -> b -> b) -> b).
Λb. λz:b. λf : (a -> b -> b). f x (xs_b z f)
-- cons :: forall a. a -> [a] -> [a]
-- cons = \ (@ a) (x :: a) (xs :: forall b. b -> (a -> b -> b) -> b)
-- (@ b) (z :: b) (f :: a -> b -> b) -> f x (xs @ b z f)

Normally when Haskell’s typechecker infers a type signature it places all quantifiers of type variables at the outermost
position such that no quantifiers appear within the body of the type expression, called the prenex restriction. This
restricts an entire class of type signatures that would otherwise be expressible within System­F, but has the benefit of
making inference much easier.
-XRankNTypes loosens the prenex restriction such that we may explicitly place quantifiers within the body of the type.
The bad news is that the general problem of inference in this relaxed system is undecidable in general, so we’re required
to explicitly annotate functions which use RankNTypes or they are otherwise inferred as rank 1 and may not typecheck
at all.

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}

QUANTIFICATION 184

-- Can't unify ( Bool ~ Char )

rank1 :: forall a. (a -> a) -> (Bool, Char)
rank1 f = (f True, f 'a')

rank2 :: (forall a. a -> a) -> (Bool, Char)

rank2 f = (f True, f 'a')

auto :: (forall a. a -> a) -> (forall b. b -> b)

auto x = x

xauto :: forall a. (forall b. b -> b) -> a -> a

xauto f = f

Monomorphic Rank 0: t
Polymorphic Rank 1: forall a. a -> t
Polymorphic Rank 2: (forall a. a -> t) -> t
Polymorphic Rank 3: ((forall a. a -> t) -> t) -> t

Of important note is that the type variables bound by an explicit quantifier in a higher ranked type may not escape their
enclosing scope. The typechecker will explicitly enforce this by enforcing that variables bound inside of rank­n types
(called skolem constants) will not unify with free meta type variables inferred by the inference engine.

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}

escape :: (forall a. a -> a) -> Int

escape f = f 0

g x = escape (\a -> x)

In this example in order for the expression to be well typed, f would necessarily have ( Int -> Int ) which implies
that a ~ Int over the whole type, but since a is bound under the quantifier it must not be unified with Int and so
the typechecker must fail with a skolem capture error.

Couldn't match expected type `a' with actual type `t'

`a' is a rigid type variable bound by a type expected by the context: a -> a
`t' is a rigid type variable bound by the inferred type of g :: t -> Int
In the expression: x In the first argument of `escape', namely `(\ a -> x)'
In the expression: escape (\ a -> x)

This can actually be used for our advantage to enforce several types of invariants about scope and use of specific type vari­
ables. For example the ST monad uses a second rank type to prevent the capture of references between ST monads with
separate state threads where the s type variable is bound within a rank­2 type and cannot escape, statically guaranteeing
that the implementation details of the ST internals can’t leak out and thus ensuring its referential transparency.

Existential Quantification
An existential type is a pair of a type and a term with a special set of packing and unpacking semantics. The type of the
value encoded in the existential is known by the producer but not by the consumer of the existential value.
185 QUANTIFICATION

{-# LANGUAGE ExistentialQuantification #-}

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}

-- ∃ t. (t, t → t, t → String)
data Box = forall a. Box
{ value :: a
, update :: a -> a
, print :: a -> String
}

boxa :: Box
boxa = Box 1 negate show

boxb :: Box
boxb = Box "foo" reverse show

apply :: Box -> String

apply (Box x f p) = p (f x)

-- ∃ t. Show t => t
data SBox = forall a. Show a => SBox a

boxes :: [SBox]
boxes = [SBox (), SBox 2, SBox "foo"]

showBox :: SBox -> String

showBox (SBox a) = show a

main :: IO ()
main = mapM_ (putStrLn . showBox) boxes
-- ()
-- 2
-- "foo"

The existential over SBox gathers a collection of values defined purely in terms of their Show interface and an opaque
pointer, no other information is available about the values and they can’t be accessed or unpacked in any other way.
Passing around existential types allows us to hide information from consumers of data types and restrict the behavior
that functions can use. Passing records around with existential variables allows a type to be “bundled” with a fixed set of
functions that operate over its hidden internals.

Impredicative Types
Although extremely brittle, GHC also has limited support for impredicative polymorphism which allows instantiating
type variable with a polymorphic type. Implied is that this loosens the restriction that quantifiers must precede arrow
types and now they may be placed inside of type­constructors.

-- Can't unify ( Int ~ Char )

revUni :: forall a. Maybe ([a] -> [a]) -> Maybe ([Int], [Char])
revUni (Just g) = Just (g [3], g "hello")
QUANTIFICATION 186

revUni Nothing = Nothing

{-# LANGUAGE ImpredicativeTypes #-}

-- Uses higher-ranked polymorphism.

f :: (forall a. [a] -> a) -> (Int, Char)
f get = (get [1,2], get ['a', 'b', 'c'])

-- Uses impredicative polymorphism.

g :: Maybe (forall a. [a] -> a) -> (Int, Char)
g Nothing = (0, '0')
g (Just get) = (get [1,2], get ['a','b','c'])

Use of this extension is very rare, and there is some consideration that -XImpredicativeTypes is fundamentally broken.
Although GHC is very liberal about telling us to enable it when one accidentally makes a typo in a type signature!
Some notable trivia, the ($) operator is wired into GHC in a very special way as to allow impredicative instantiation
of runST to be applied via ($) by special­casing the ($) operator only when used for the ST monad.

For example if we define a function apply which should behave identically to ($) we’ll get an error about polymorphic
instantiation even though they are defined identically!

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}

import Control.Monad.ST

f `apply` x = f x

foo :: (forall s. ST s a) -> a

foo st = runST $ st

bar :: (forall s. ST s a) -> a

bar st = runST `apply` st

Couldn't match expected type `forall s. ST s a'

with actual type `ST s0 a'
In the second argument of `apply', namely `st'
In the expression: runST `apply` st
In an equation for `bar': bar st = runST `apply` st

See:
• SPJ Notes on $

Scoped Type Variables

Normally the type variables used within the toplevel signature for a function are only scoped to the type­signature and not
the body of the function and its rigid signatures over terms and let/where clauses. Enabling -XScopedTypeVariables
loosens this restriction allowing the type variables mentioned in the toplevel to be scoped within the value­level body of
a function and all signatures contained therein.
187 QUANTIFICATION

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

poly :: forall a b c. a -> b -> c -> (a, a)

poly x y z = (f x y, f x z)
where
-- second argument is universally quantified from inference
-- f :: forall t0 t1. t0 -> t1 -> t0
f x' _ = x'

mono :: forall a b c. a -> b -> c -> (a, a)

mono x y z = (f x y, f x z)
where
-- b is not implicitly universally quantified because it is in scope
f :: a -> b -> a
f x' _ = x'

example :: IO ()
example = do
x :: [Int] <- readLn
print x
QUANTIFICATION 188
Chapter 13

GADTs

Generalized Algebraic Data types (GADTs) are an extension to algebraic datatypes that allow us to qualify the constructors
to datatypes with type equality constraints, allowing a class of types that are not expressible using vanilla ADTs.
-XGADTs implicitly enables an alternative syntax for datatype declarations ( -XGADTSyntax ) such that the following
declarations are equivalent:

-- Vanilla
data List a
= Empty
| Cons a (List a)

-- GADTSyntax
data List a where
Empty :: List a
Cons :: a -> List a -> List a

For an example use consider the data type Term , we have a term in which we Succ which takes a Term parameterized
by a which spans all types. Problems arise between the clash whether ( a ~ Bool ) or ( a ~ Int ) when trying to write
the evaluator.

data Term a
= Lit a
| Succ (Term a)
| IsZero (Term a)

-- can't be well-typed :(
eval (Lit i) = i
eval (Succ t) = 1 + eval t
eval (IsZero i) = eval i == 0

And we admit the construction of meaningless terms which forces more error handling cases.

-- This is a valid type.

failure = Succ ( Lit True )

Using a GADT we can express the type invariants for our language (i.e. only type­safe expressions are representable).
Pattern matching on this GADT then carries type equality constraints without the need for explicit tags.

189
GADTS 190

{-# Language GADTs #-}

data Term a where

Lit :: a -> Term a
Succ :: Term Int -> Term Int
IsZero :: Term Int -> Term Bool
If :: Term Bool -> Term a -> Term a -> Term a

eval :: Term a -> a

eval (Lit i) = i -- Term a
eval (Succ t) = 1 + eval t -- Term (a ~ Int)
eval (IsZero i) = eval i == 0 -- Term (a ~ Int)
eval (If b e1 e2) = if eval b then eval e1 else eval e2 -- Term (a ~ Bool)

example :: Int
example = eval (Succ (Succ (Lit 3)))

This time around:

-- This is rejected at compile-time.

failure = Succ ( Lit True )

Explicit equality constraints ( a ~ b ) can be added to a function’s context. For example the following expand out to the
same types.

f :: a -> a -> (a, a)

f :: (a ~ b) => a -> b -> (a,b)

(Int ~ Int) => ...

(a ~ Int) => ...
(Int ~ a) => ...
(a ~ b) => ...
(Int ~ Bool) => ... -- Will not typecheck.

This is effectively the implementation detail of what GHC is doing behind the scenes to implement GADTs ( implicitly
passing and threading equality terms around ). If we wanted we could do the same setup that GHC does just using
equality constraints and existential quantification. Indeed, the internal representation of GADTs is as regular algebraic
datatypes that carry coercion evidence as arguments.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ExistentialQuantification #-}

-- Using Constraints
data Exp a
= (a ~ Int) => LitInt a
| (a ~ Bool) => LitBool a
| forall b. (b ~ Bool) => If (Exp b) (Exp a) (Exp a)

-- Using GADTs
191 GADTS

-- data Exp a where

-- LitInt :: Int -> Exp Int
-- LitBool :: Bool -> Exp Bool
-- If :: Exp Bool -> Exp a -> Exp a -> Exp a

eval :: Exp a -> a

eval e = case e of
LitInt i -> i
LitBool b -> b
If b tr fl -> if eval b then eval tr else eval fl

In the presence of GADTs inference becomes intractable in many cases, often requiring an explicit annotation. For
example f can either have T a -> [a] or T a -> [Int] and neither is principal.

data T :: * -> * where

T1 :: Int -> T Int
T2 :: T a

f (T1 n) = [n]
f T2 = []

Kind Signatures
Haskell’s kind system (i.e. the “type of the types”) is a system consisting the single kind * and an arrow kind -> .

κ : *
| κ -> κ

Int :: *
Maybe :: * -> *
Either :: * -> * -> *

There are in fact some extensions to this system that will be covered later ( see: PolyKinds and Unboxed types in later
sections ) but most kinds in everyday code are simply either stars or arrows.
With the KindSignatures extension enabled we can now annotate top level type signatures with their explicit kinds,
bypassing the normal kind inference procedures.

{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

id :: forall (a :: *). a -> a

id x = x

On top of default GADT declaration we can also constrain the parameters of the GADT to specific kinds. For basic
usage Haskell’s kind inference can deduce this reasonably well, but combined with some other type system extensions
that extend the kind system this becomes essential.

{-# Language GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
GADTS 192

data Term a :: * where

Lit :: a -> Term a
Succ :: Term Int -> Term Int
IsZero :: Term Int -> Term Bool
If :: Term Bool -> Term a -> Term a -> Term a

data Vec :: * -> * -> * where

Nil :: Vec n a
Cons :: a -> Vec n a -> Vec n a

data Fix :: (* -> *) -> * where

In :: f (Fix f) -> Fix f

Void
The Void type is the type with no inhabitants. It unifies only with itself.
Using a newtype wrapper we can create a type where recursion makes it impossible to construct an inhabitant.

-- Void :: Void -> Void

newtype Void = Void Void

Or using -XEmptyDataDecls we can also construct the uninhabited type equivalently as a data declaration with no
constructors.

data Void

The only inhabitant of both of these types is a diverging term like ( undefined ).

Phantom Types
Phantom types are parameters that appear on the left hand side of a type declaration but which are not constrained by
the values of the types inhabitants. They are effectively slots for us to encode additional information at the type­level.

import Data.Void

data Foo tag a = Foo a

combine :: Num a => Foo tag a -> Foo tag a -> Foo tag a
combine (Foo a) (Foo b) = Foo (a+b)

-- All identical at the value level, but differ at the type level.
a :: Foo () Int
a = Foo 1

b :: Foo t Int
b = Foo 1

c :: Foo Void Int

193 GADTS

c = Foo 1

-- () ~ ()
example1 :: Foo () Int
example1 = combine a a

-- t ~ ()
example2 :: Foo () Int
example2 = combine a b

-- t0 ~ t1
example3 :: Foo t Int
example3 = combine b b

-- Couldn't match type `t' with `Void'

example4 :: Foo t Int
example4 = combine b c

Notice the type variable tag does not appear in the right hand side of the declaration. Using this allows us to express
invariants at the type­level that need not manifest at the value­level. We’re effectively programming by adding extra
information at the type­level.

Consider the case of using newtypes to statically distinguish between plaintext and cryptotext.

newtype Plaintext = Plaintext Text

newtype Crytpotext = Cryptotext Text

encrypt :: Key -> Plaintext -> Cryptotext

decrypt :: Key -> Cryptotext -> Plaintext

Using phantom types we use an extra parameter.

import Data.Text

data Cryptotext
data Plaintext

data Msg a = Msg Text

encrypt :: Msg Plaintext -> Msg Cryptotext

encrypt = undefined

decrypt :: Msg Cryptotext -> Msg Plaintext

decrypt = undefined

Using -XEmptyDataDecls can be a powerful combination with phantom types that contain no value inhabitants and
are “anonymous types”.

{-# LANGUAGE EmptyDataDecls #-}

data Token a
GADTS 194

The tagged library defines a similar Tagged newtype wrapper.

Typelevel Operations
With a richer language for datatypes we can express terms that witness the relationship between terms in the constructors,
for example we can now express a term which expresses propositional equality between two types.
The type Eql a b is a proof that types a and b are equal, by pattern matching on the single Refl constructor we
introduce the equality constraint into the body of the pattern match.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

-- a ≡ b
data Eql a b where
Refl :: Eql a a

-- Congruence
-- (f : A → B) {x y} → x ≡ y → f x ≡ f y
cong :: Eql a b -> Eql (f a) (f b)
cong Refl = Refl

-- Symmetry
-- {a b : A} → a ≡ b → a ≡ b
sym :: Eql a b -> Eql b a
sym Refl = Refl

-- Transitivity
-- {a b c : A} → a ≡ b → b ≡ c → a ≡ c
trans :: Eql a b -> Eql b c -> Eql a c
trans Refl Refl = Refl

-- Coerce one type to another given a proof of their equality.

-- {a b : A} → a ≡ b → a → b
castWith :: Eql a b -> a -> b
castWith Refl = id

-- Trivial cases
a :: forall n. Eql n n
a = Refl

b :: forall. Eql () ()
b = Refl

As of GHC 7.8 these constructors and functions are included in the Prelude in the Data.Type.Equality module.
Chapter 14

Interpreters

The lambda calculus forms the theoretical and practical foundation for many languages. At the heart of every calculus is
three components:

• Var ­ A variable
• Lam ­ A lambda abstraction
• App ­ An application

There are many different ways of modeling these constructions and data structure representations, but they all more or
less contain these three elements. For example, a lambda calculus that uses String names on lambda binders and variables
might be written like the following:

type Name = String

data Exp
= Var Name
| Lam Name Exp
| App Exp Exp

A lambda expression in which all variables that appear in the body of the expression are referenced in an outer lambda
binder is said to be closed while an expression with unbound free variables is open.

HOAS
Higher Order Abstract Syntax (HOAS) is a technique for implementing the lambda calculus in a language where the
binders of the lambda expression map directly onto lambda binders of the host language ( i.e. Haskell ) to give us
substitution machinery in our custom language by exploiting Haskell’s implementation.

195
INTERPRETERS 196

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

data Expr a where

Con :: a -> Expr a
Lam :: (Expr a -> Expr b) -> Expr (a -> b)
App :: Expr (a -> b) -> Expr a -> Expr b

i :: Expr (a -> a)
i = Lam (\x -> x)

k :: Expr (a -> b -> a)

k = Lam (\x -> Lam (\y -> x))

s :: Expr ((a -> b -> c) -> (a -> b) -> (a -> c))

s = Lam (\x -> Lam (\y -> Lam (\z -> App (App x z) (App y z))))

eval :: Expr a -> a

eval (Con v) = v
eval (Lam f) = \x -> eval (f (Con x))
eval (App e1 e2) = (eval e1) (eval e2)

skk :: Expr (a -> a)

skk = App (App s k) k

example :: Integer
example = eval skk 1
-- 1

Pretty printing HOAS terms can also be quite complicated since the body of the function is under a Haskell lambda
binder.

PHOAS
A slightly different form of HOAS called PHOAS uses lambda datatype parameterized over the binder type. In this form
evaluation requires unpacking into a separate Value type to wrap the lambda expression.

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}

data ExprP a
= VarP a
| AppP (ExprP a) (ExprP a)
| LamP (a -> ExprP a)
| LitP Integer

data Value
= VLit Integer
| VFun (Value -> Value)

fromVFun :: Value -> (Value -> Value)

fromVFun val = case val of
197 INTERPRETERS

VFun f -> f
_ -> error "not a function"

fromVLit :: Value -> Integer

fromVLit val = case val of
VLit n -> n
_ -> error "not a integer"

newtype Expr = Expr { unExpr :: forall a . ExprP a }

eval :: Expr -> Value

eval e = ev (unExpr e) where
ev (LamP f) = VFun(ev . f)
ev (VarP v) = v
ev (AppP e1 e2) = fromVFun (ev e1) (ev e2)
ev (LitP n) = VLit n

i :: ExprP a
i = LamP (\a -> VarP a)

k :: ExprP a
k = LamP (\x -> LamP (\y -> VarP x))

s :: ExprP a
s = LamP (\x -> LamP (\y -> LamP (\z -> AppP (AppP (VarP x) (VarP z)) (AppP (VarP y) (VarP z)))))

skk :: ExprP a
skk = AppP (AppP s k) k

example :: Integer
example = fromVLit $ eval $ Expr (AppP skk (LitP 3))

See:
• PHOAS
• Encoding Higher­Order Abstract Syntax with Parametric Polymorphism

Final Interpreters
Using typeclasses we can implement a final interpreter which models a set of extensible terms using functions bound to
typeclasses rather than data constructors. Instances of the typeclass form interpreters over these terms.
For example we can write a small language that includes basic arithmetic, and then retroactively extend our expression
language with a multiplication operator without changing the base. At the same time our interpreter logic remains
invariant under extension with new expressions.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE NoMonomorphismRestriction #-}

class Expr repr where

INTERPRETERS 198

lit :: Int -> repr

neg :: repr -> repr
add :: repr -> repr -> repr
mul :: repr -> repr -> repr

instance Expr Int where

lit n = n
neg a = -a
add a b = a + b
mul a b = a * b

instance Expr String where

lit n = show n
neg a = "(-" ++ a ++ ")"
add a b = "(" ++ a ++ " + " ++ b ++ ")"
mul a b = "(" ++ a ++ " * " ++ b ++ ")"

class BoolExpr repr where

eq :: repr -> repr -> repr
tr :: repr
fl :: repr

instance BoolExpr Int where

eq a b = if a == b then tr else fl
tr = 1
fl = 0

instance BoolExpr String where

eq a b = "(" ++ a ++ " == " ++ b ++ ")"
tr = "true"
fl = "false"

eval :: Int -> Int

eval = id

render :: String -> String

render = id

expr :: (BoolExpr repr, Expr repr) => repr

expr = eq (add (lit 1) (lit 2)) (lit 3)

result :: Int
result = eval expr
-- 1

string :: String
string = render expr
-- "((1 + 2) == 3)"

Finally Tagless
Writing an evaluator for the lambda calculus can likewise also be modeled with a final interpreter and a Identity functor.
199 INTERPRETERS

import Prelude hiding (id)

class Expr rep where

lam :: (rep a -> rep b) -> rep (a -> b)
app :: rep (a -> b) -> (rep a -> rep b)
lit :: a -> rep a

newtype Interpret a = R { reify :: a }

instance Expr Interpret where

lam f = R $ reify . f . R
app f a = R $ reify f $ reify a
lit = R

eval :: Interpret a -> a

eval e = reify e

e1 :: Expr rep => rep Int

e1 = app (lam (\x -> x)) (lit 3)

e2 :: Expr rep => rep Int

e2 = app (lam (\x -> lit 4)) (lam $ \x -> lam $ \y -> y)

example1 :: Int
example1 = eval e1
-- 3

example2 :: Int
example2 = eval e2
-- 4

See: Typed Tagless Interpretations and Typed Compilation

Datatypes
The usual hand­wavy way of describing algebraic datatypes is to indicate the how natural correspondence between sum
types, product types, and polynomial expressions arises.

data Void -- 0
data Unit = Unit -- 1
data Sum a b = Inl a | Inr b -- a + b
data Prod a b = Prod a b -- a * b
type (->) a b = a -> b -- b ^ a

Intuitively it follows the notion that the cardinality of set of inhabitants of a type can always be given as a function of the
number of its holes. A product type admits a number of inhabitants as a function of the product (i.e. cardinality of the
Cartesian product), a sum type as the sum of its holes and a function type as the exponential of the span of the domain
and codomain.

-- 1 + A
INTERPRETERS 200

data Maybe a = Nothing | Just a

Recursive types correspond to infinite series of these terms.

-- pseudocode

-- µX. 1 + X
data Nat a = Z | S Nat
Nat a = µ a. 1 + a
= 1 + (1 + (1 + ...))

-- µX. 1 + A * X
data List a = Nil | Cons a (List a)
List a = µ a. 1 + a * (List a)
= 1 + a + a^2 + a^3 + a^4 ...

-- µX. A + A*X*X
data Tree a f = Leaf a | Tree a f f
Tree a = µ a. 1 + a * (List a)
= 1 + a^2 + a^4 + a^6 + a^8 ...

F­Algebras
The initial algebra approach differs from the final interpreter approach in that we now represent our terms as algebraic
datatypes and the interpreter implements recursion and evaluation occurs through pattern matching.

type Algebra f a = f a -> a

type Coalgebra f a = a -> f a
newtype Fix f = Fix { unFix :: f (Fix f) }

cata :: Functor f => Algebra f a -> Fix f -> a

ana :: Functor f => Coalgebra f a -> a -> Fix f
hylo :: Functor f => Algebra f b -> Coalgebra f a -> a -> b

In Haskell a F­algebra is a functor f a together with a function f a -> a . A coalgebra reverses the function. For a
functor f we can form its recursive unrolling using the recursive Fix newtype wrapper.

newtype Fix f = Fix { unFix :: f (Fix f) }

Fix :: f (Fix f) -> Fix f

unFix :: Fix f -> f (Fix f)

Fix f = f (f (f (f (f (f ( ... ))))))

newtype T b a = T (a -> b)

Fix (T a)
Fix T -> a
(Fix T -> a) -> a
201 INTERPRETERS

(Fix T -> a) -> a -> a

...

In this form we can write down a generalized fold/unfold function that are datatype generic and written purely in terms
of the recursing under the functor.

cata :: Functor f => Algebra f a -> Fix f -> a

cata alg = alg . fmap (cata alg) . unFix

ana :: Functor f => Coalgebra f a -> a -> Fix f

ana coalg = Fix . fmap (ana coalg) . coalg

We call these functions catamorphisms and anamorphisms. Notice especially that the types of these two functions simply
reverse the direction of arrows. Interpreted in another way they transform an algebra/coalgebra which defines a flat
structure­preserving mapping between Fix f f into a function which either rolls or unrolls the fixpoint. What is
particularly nice about this approach is that the recursion is abstracted away inside the functor definition and we are free
to just implement the flat transformation logic!

For example a construction of the natural numbers in this form:

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE StandaloneDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

type Algebra f a = f a -> a

type Coalgebra f a = a -> f a

newtype Fix f = Fix {unFix :: f (Fix f)}

-- catamorphism
cata :: Functor f => Algebra f a -> Fix f -> a
cata alg = alg . fmap (cata alg) . unFix

-- anamorphism
ana :: Functor f => Coalgebra f a -> a -> Fix f
ana coalg = Fix . fmap (ana coalg) . coalg

-- hylomorphism
hylo :: Functor f => Algebra f b -> Coalgebra f a -> a -> b
hylo f g = cata f . ana g

type Nat = Fix NatF

data NatF a = S a | Z deriving (Eq, Show)

instance Functor NatF where

fmap f Z = Z
fmap f (S x) = S (f x)
INTERPRETERS 202

plus :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat

plus n = cata phi
where
phi Z = n
phi (S m) = s m

times :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat

times n = cata phi
where
phi Z = z
phi (S m) = plus n m

int :: Nat -> Int

int = cata phi
where
phi Z = 0
phi (S f) = 1 + f

nat :: Integer -> Nat

nat = ana (psi Z S)
where
psi f _ 0 = f
psi _ f n = f (n -1)

z :: Nat
z = Fix Z

s :: Nat -> Nat

s = Fix . S

type Str = Fix StrF

data StrF x = Cons Char x | Nil

instance Functor StrF where

fmap f (Cons a as) = Cons a (f as)
fmap f Nil = Nil

nil :: Str
nil = Fix Nil

cons :: Char -> Str -> Str

cons x xs = Fix (Cons x xs)

str :: Str -> String

str = cata phi
where
phi Nil = []
phi (Cons x xs) = x : xs

str' :: String -> Str

str' = ana (psi Nil Cons)
where
203 INTERPRETERS

psi f _ [] = f
psi _ f (a : as) = f a as

map' :: (Char -> Char) -> Str -> Str

map' f = hylo g unFix
where
g Nil = Fix Nil
g (Cons a x) = Fix $ Cons (f a) x

type Tree a = Fix (TreeF a)

data TreeF a f = Leaf a | Tree a f f deriving (Show)

instance Functor (TreeF a) where

fmap f (Leaf a) = Leaf a
fmap f (Tree a b c) = Tree a (f b) (f c)

depth :: Tree a -> Int

depth = cata phi
where
phi (Leaf _) = 0
phi (Tree _ l r) = 1 + max l r

example1 :: Int
example1 = int (plus (nat 125) (nat 25))
-- 150

Or for example an interpreter for a small expression language that depends on a scoping dictionary.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}
{-# LANGUAGE StandaloneDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import Control.Applicative
import qualified Data.Map as M

type Algebra f a = f a -> a

type Coalgebra f a = a -> f a

newtype Fix f = Fix { unFix :: f (Fix f) }

cata :: Functor f => Algebra f a -> Fix f -> a

cata alg = alg . fmap (cata alg) . unFix

ana :: Functor f => Coalgebra f a -> a -> Fix f

ana coalg = Fix . fmap (ana coalg) . coalg

hylo :: Functor f => Algebra f b -> Coalgebra f a -> a -> b

hylo f g = cata f . ana g
INTERPRETERS 204

type Id = String
type Env = M.Map Id Int

type Expr = Fix ExprF

data ExprF a
= Lit Int
| Var Id
| Add a a
| Mul a a
deriving (Show, Eq, Ord, Functor)

deriving instance Eq (f (Fix f)) => Eq (Fix f)

deriving instance Ord (f (Fix f)) => Ord (Fix f)
deriving instance Show (f (Fix f)) => Show (Fix f)

eval :: M.Map Id Int -> Fix ExprF -> Maybe Int

eval env = cata phi where
phi ex = case ex of
Lit c -> pure c
Var i -> M.lookup i env
Add x y -> liftA2 (+) x y
Mul x y -> liftA2 (*) x y

expr :: Expr
expr = Fix (Mul n (Fix (Add x y)))
where
n = Fix (Lit 10)
x = Fix (Var "x")
y = Fix (Var "y")

env :: M.Map Id Int

env = M.fromList [("x", 1), ("y", 2)]

compose :: (f (Fix f) -> c) -> (a -> Fix f) -> a -> c

compose x y = x . unFix . y

example :: Maybe Int

example = eval env expr
-- Just 30

What is especially elegant about this approach is how naturally catamorphisms compose into efficient composite trans­
formations.

compose :: Functor f => (f (Fix f) -> c) -> (a -> Fix f) -> a -> c
compose f g = f . unFix . g

Recursion Schemes & The Morphism Zoo

Recursion schemes are a generally way of classifying a families of traversal algorithms that modify data structures re­
cursively. Recursion schemes give rise to a rich set of algebraic structures which can be composed to devise all sorts of
elaborate term rewrite systems. Most applications of recursion schemes occur in the context of graph rewriting or abstract
205 INTERPRETERS

syntax tree manipulation.

Several basic recursion schemes form the foundation of these rules. Grossly, a anamorphism is an unfolding of a data
structure into a list of terms, while a catamorphism is a is the refolding of a data structure from a list of terms.

Name Type Signature

Catamorphism cata :: (a -> b -> b) -> b -> [a] -> b
Anamorphism ana :: (b -> Maybe (a, b)) -> b -> [a]
Paramorphism para :: (a -> ([a], b) -> b) -> b -> [a] -> b
Apomorphism apo :: (b -> (a, Either [a] b)) -> b -> [a]
Hylomorphism hylo :: Functor f => (f b -> b) -> (a -> f a) -> a -> b

For a Fix point type over a type with a Functor instance for the parameter f we can write down the recursion schemes
as the following definitions:

-- | A fix-point type.
newtype Fix f = Fix { unFix :: f (Fix f) }

-- | Catamorphism or generic function fold.

cata :: Functor f => (f a -> a) -> (Fix f -> a)
cata f = f . fmap (cata f) . unFix

-- | Anamorphism or generic function unfold.

ana :: Functor f => (a -> f a) -> (a -> Fix f)
ana f = Fix . fmap (ana f) . f

-- | Hylomorphism
hylo :: Functor f => (f b -> b) -> (a -> f a) -> a -> b
hylo f g = h where h = f . fmap h . g

-- Paramorphism
para :: Functor f => (f (Fix f, t) -> t) -> Fix f -> t
para f (Fix x) = psi (fmap l x) where
l x = (x, para f x)

One can also construct monadic versions of these functions which have a result type inside of a monad. Instead of using
function composition we use Kleisi composition.

-- Monadic catamorphism
cataM :: (Traversable f, Monad m) => (f a -> m a) -> Fix f -> m a
cataM f = f <=< traverse (cataM f) . unfix

The library recursion-schemes implements these basic recursion schemes as well as whole family of higher­order
combinators off the shelf. These are implemented in terms of two typeclases Recursive and Corecursive which
extend an instance of Functor with default methods for catamorphisms and anamorphisms. For the Fix type above
these functions expand into the following definitions:

class Functor t => Recursive t where

project :: t -> t t
cata :: (t a -> a) -> t -> a
cata f = c where c = f . fmap c . project
INTERPRETERS 206

class Functor t => Corecursive t where

embed :: t -> t t
ana :: (a -> t a) -> a -> t
ana g = a where a = embed . fmap a . g

-- Additional ListF helper

data ListF a b = Nil | Cons a b

The canonical example of a catamorphism is the factorial function which is a composition of a coalgebra which creates
a list from n to 1 and an algebra which multiplies the resulting list to a single result:

import Data.Functor.Foldable

factorial :: Int -> Int

factorial = hylo alg coalg
where
coalg :: Int -> ListF Int Int
coalg m
| m <= 1 = Nil
| otherwise = Cons m (m - 1)
alg :: ListF Int Int -> Int
alg Nil = 1
alg (Cons a x) = a * x

Another example is unfolding of lambda calculus to perform a substitution over a variable. We can define a catamoprhism
for traversing over the AST.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}

import Control.Monad hiding (forM_, mapM, sequence)

import qualified Data.Map as M
import Data.Traversable
import Prelude hiding (mapM)

newtype Fix (f :: * -> *) = Fix {outF :: f (Fix f)}

-- Catamorphism
cata :: Functor f => (f a -> a) -> Fix f -> a
cata f = f . fmap (cata f) . outF

-- Monadic catamorphism
cataM :: (Traversable f, Monad m) => (f a -> m a) -> Fix f -> m a
cataM f = f <=< mapM (cataM f) . outF

data ExprF r
= EVar String
| EApp r r
| ELam r r
207 INTERPRETERS

deriving (Show, Eq, Ord, Functor)

type Expr = Fix ExprF

instance Show (Fix ExprF) where

show (Fix f) = show f

instance Eq (Fix ExprF) where

Fix x == Fix y = x == y

instance Ord (Fix ExprF) where

compare (Fix x) (Fix y) = compare x y

mkApp :: Fix ExprF -> Fix ExprF -> Fix ExprF

mkApp x y = Fix (EApp x y)

mkVar :: String -> Fix ExprF

mkVar x = Fix (EVar x)

mkLam :: Fix ExprF -> Fix ExprF -> Fix ExprF

mkLam x y = Fix (ELam x y)

i :: Fix ExprF
i = mkLam (mkVar "x") (mkVar "x")

k :: Fix ExprF
k = mkLam (mkVar "x") $ mkLam (mkVar "y") $ (mkVar "x")

subst :: M.Map String (ExprF Expr) -> Expr -> Expr

subst env = cata alg
where
alg (EVar x) | Just e <- M.lookup x env = Fix e
alg e = Fix e

Another use case would be to collect the free variables inside of the AST. This example use the recursion-schemes
library.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveFunctor #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import Data.Functor.Foldable

type Var = String

data Exp
= Var Var
| App Exp Exp
| Lam [Var] Exp
deriving (Show)

data ExpF a
= VarF Var
INTERPRETERS 208

| AppF a a
| LamF [Var] a
deriving (Functor)

type instance Base Exp = ExpF

instance Recursive Exp where

project (Var a) = VarF a
project (App a b) = AppF a b
project (Lam a b) = LamF a b

instance Corecursive Exp where

embed (VarF a) = Var a
embed (AppF a b) = App a b
embed (LamF a b) = Lam a b

fvs :: Exp -> [Var]

fvs = cata phi
where
phi (VarF a) = [a]
phi (AppF a b) = a ++ b
phi (LamF a b) = foldr (filter . (/=)) a b

See:
• recursion­schemes

Hint and Mueval

GHC itself can actually interpret arbitrary Haskell source on the fly by hooking into the GHC’s bytecode interpreter (
the same used for GHCi ). The hint package allows us to parse, typecheck, and evaluate arbitrary strings into arbitrary
Haskell programs and evaluate them.

import Language.Haskell.Interpreter

foo :: Interpreter String

foo = eval "(\\x -> x) 1"

example :: IO (Either InterpreterError String)

example = runInterpreter foo

This is generally not a wise thing to build a library around, unless of course the purpose of the program is itself to evaluate
arbitrary Haskell code ( something like an online Haskell shell or the likes ).
Both hint and mueval do effectively the same task, designed around slightly different internals of the GHC Api.
See:
• hint
• mueval
Chapter 15

Testing

Unit testing frameworks are an important component in the Haskell ecosystem. Program correctness is a central philo­
sophical concept and unit testing forms the third part of the ecosystem that includes strong type system and property
testing. Generally speaking unit tests tend to be of less importance in Haskell since the type system makes an enor­
mous amount of invalid programs completely inexpressible by construction. Unit tests tend to be written later in the
development lifecycle and generally tend to be about the core logic of the program and not the intermediate plumbing.

A prominent school of thought on Haskell library design tends to favor constructing programs built around strong
equational laws which guarantee strong invariants about program behavior under composition. Many of the testing
tools are built around this style of design.

QuickCheck
Probably the most famous Haskell library, QuickCheck is a testing framework. This is a framework for generating large
random tests for arbitrary functions automatically based on the types of their arguments.

quickCheck :: Testable prop => prop -> IO ()

(==>) :: Testable prop => Bool -> prop -> Property
forAll :: (Show a, Testable prop) => Gen a -> (a -> prop) -> Property
choose :: Random a => (a, a) -> Gen a

import Test.QuickCheck

qsort :: [Int] -> [Int]

qsort [] = []
qsort (x:xs) = qsort lhs ++ [x] ++ qsort rhs
where lhs = filter (< x) xs
rhs = filter (>= x) xs

prop_maximum :: [Int] -> Property

prop_maximum xs = not (null xs) ==>
last (qsort xs) == maximum xs

main :: IO ()
main = quickCheck prop_maximum

209
TESTING 210

$ runhaskell qcheck.hs
*** Failed! Falsifiable (after 3 tests and 4 shrinks):
[0]
[1]

$ runhaskell qcheck.hs
+++ OK, passed 1000 tests.

The test data generator can be extended with custom types and refined with predicates that restrict the domain of cases
to test.

import Test.QuickCheck

data Color = Red | Green | Blue deriving Show

instance Arbitrary Color where

arbitrary = do
n <- choose (0,2) :: Gen Int
return $ case n of
0 -> Red
1 -> Green
2 -> Blue

example1 :: IO [Color]
example1 = sample' arbitrary
-- [Red,Green,Red,Blue,Red,Red,Red,Blue,Green,Red,Red]

See: QuickCheck: An Automatic Testing Tool for Haskell

SmallCheck
Like QuickCheck, SmallCheck is a property testing system but instead of producing random arbitrary test data it instead
enumerates a deterministic series of test data to a fixed depth.

smallCheck :: Testable IO a => Depth -> a -> IO ()

list :: Depth -> Series Identity a -> [a]
sample' :: Gen a -> IO [a]

λ: list 3 series :: [Int]

[0,1,-1,2,-2,3,-3]

λ: list 3 series :: [Double]

[0.0,1.0,-1.0,2.0,0.5,-2.0,4.0,0.25,-0.5,-4.0,-0.25]

λ: list 3 series :: [(Int, String)]

[(0,""),(1,""),(0,"a"),(-1,""),(0,"b"),(1,"a"),(2,""),(1,"b"),(-1,"a"),(-2,""),(-1,"b"),(2,"a"),(-2,"a"),(2,"b"

It is useful to generate test cases over all possible inputs of a program up to some depth.
211 TESTING

import Test.SmallCheck

distrib :: Int -> Int -> Int -> Bool

distrib a b c = a * (b + c) == a * b + a * c

cauchy :: [Double] -> [Double] -> Bool

cauchy xs ys = (abs (dot xs ys))^2 <= (dot xs xs) * (dot ys ys)

failure :: [Double] -> [Double] -> Bool

failure xs ys = abs (dot xs ys) <= (dot xs xs) * (dot ys ys)

dot :: Num a => [a] -> [a] -> a

dot xs ys = sum (zipWith (*) xs ys)

main :: IO ()
main = do
putStrLn "Testing distributivity..."
smallCheck 25 distrib

putStrLn "Testing Cauchy-Schwarz..."

smallCheck 4 cauchy

putStrLn "Testing invalid Cauchy-Schwarz..."

smallCheck 4 failure

$ runhaskell smallcheck.hs
Testing distributivity...
Completed 132651 tests without failure.

Testing Cauchy-Schwarz...
Completed 27556 tests without failure.

Testing invalid Cauchy-Schwarz...

Failed test no. 349.
there exist [1.0] [0.5] such that
condition is false

Just like for QuickCheck we can implement series instances for our custom datatypes. For example there is no default
instance for Vector, so let’s implement one:

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

import Test.SmallCheck
import Test.SmallCheck.Series
import Control.Applicative

import qualified Data.Vector as V

dot :: Num a => V.Vector a -> V.Vector a -> a

dot xs ys = V.sum (V.zipWith (*) xs ys)
TESTING 212

cauchy :: V.Vector Double -> V.Vector Double -> Bool

cauchy xs ys = (abs (dot xs ys))^2 <= (dot xs xs) * (dot ys ys)

instance (Serial m a, Monad m) => Serial m (V.Vector a) where

series = V.fromList <$> series

main :: IO ()
main = smallCheck 4 cauchy

SmallCheck can also use Generics to derive Serial instances, for example to enumerate all trees of a certain depth we
might use:

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

import GHC.Generics
import Test.SmallCheck.Series

data Tree a = Null | Fork (Tree a) a (Tree a)

deriving (Show, Generic)

instance Serial m a => Serial m (Tree a)

example :: [Tree ()]

example = list 3 series

main = print example

QuickSpec
Using the QuickCheck arbitrary machinery we can also rather remarkably enumerate a large number of combinations of
functions to try and deduce algebraic laws from trying out inputs for small cases. Of course the fundamental limitation
of this approach is that a function may not exhibit any interesting properties for small cases or for simple function
compositions. So in general case this approach won’t work, but practically it still quite useful.

{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import Data.List
import Data.Typeable
import QuickSpec hiding (arith, bools, lists)
import Test.QuickCheck.Arbitrary

type Var k a = (Typeable a, Arbitrary a, CoArbitrary a, k a)

listCons :: forall a. Var Ord a => a -> Sig

listCons a =
background
213 TESTING

[ "[]" `fun0` ([] :: [a]),

":" `fun2` ((:) :: a -> [a] -> [a])
]

lists :: forall a. Var Ord a => a -> [Sig]

lists a =
[ -- Names to print arbitrary variables
funs',
funvars',
vars',
-- Ambient definitions
listCons a,
-- Expressions to deduce properties of
"sort" `fun1` (sort :: [a] -> [a]),
"map" `fun2` (map :: (a -> a) -> [a] -> [a]),
"id" `fun1` (id :: [a] -> [a]),
"reverse" `fun1` (reverse :: [a] -> [a]),
"minimum" `fun1` (minimum :: [a] -> a),
"length" `fun1` (length :: [a] -> Int),
"++" `fun2` ((++) :: [a] -> [a] -> [a])
]
where
funs' = funs (undefined :: a)
funvars' = vars ["f", "g", "h"] (undefined :: a -> a)
vars' = ["xs", "ys", "zs"] `vars` (undefined :: [a])

tvar :: A
tvar = undefined

main :: IO ()
main = quickSpec (lists tvar)

Running this we rather see it is able to deduce most of the laws for list functions.

$ runhaskell src/quickspec.hs
-- background functions --
id :: A -> A
(:) :: A -> [A] -> [A]
(.) :: (A -> A) -> (A -> A) -> A -> A
[] :: [A]
-- variables --
f, g, h :: A -> A
xs, ys, zs :: [A]
== Equations about map ==
1: map f [] == []
2: map id xs == xs
3: map (f.g) xs == map f (map g xs)
== Equations about minimum ==
4: minimum [] == undefined
== Equations about (++) ==
5: xs++[] == xs
6: []++xs == xs
TESTING 214

7: (xs++ys)++zs == xs++(ys++zs)
== Equations about sort ==
8: sort [] == []
9: sort (sort xs) == sort xs
== Equations about id ==
10: id xs == xs
== Equations about reverse ==
11: reverse [] == []
12: reverse (reverse xs) == xs
== Equations about several functions ==
13: minimum (xs++ys) == minimum (ys++xs)
14: length (map f xs) == length xs
15: length (xs++ys) == length (ys++xs)
16: sort (xs++ys) == sort (ys++xs)
17: map f (reverse xs) == reverse (map f xs)
18: minimum (sort xs) == minimum xs
19: minimum (reverse xs) == minimum xs
20: minimum (xs++xs) == minimum xs
21: length (sort xs) == length xs
22: length (reverse xs) == length xs
23: sort (reverse xs) == sort xs
24: map f xs++map f ys == map f (xs++ys)
25: reverse xs++reverse ys == reverse (ys++xs)

Keep in mind the rather remarkable fact that this is all deduced automatically from the types alone!

Tasty
Tasty is the commonly used unit testing framework. It combines all of the testing frameworks (Quickcheck, SmallCheck,
HUnit) into a common API for forming runnable batches of tests and collecting the results.

import Test.Tasty
import Test.Tasty.HUnit
import Test.Tasty.QuickCheck
import qualified Test.Tasty.SmallCheck as SC

arith :: Integer -> Integer -> Property

arith x y = (x > 0) && (y > 0) ==> (x+y)^2 > x^2 + y^2

negation :: Integer -> Bool

negation x = abs (x^2) >= x

suite :: TestTree
suite = testGroup "Test Suite" [
testGroup "Units"
[ testCase "Equality" $ True @=? True
, testCase "Assertion" $ assert $ (length [1,2,3]) == 3
],

testGroup "QuickCheck tests"

[ testProperty "Quickcheck test" arith
215 TESTING

],

testGroup "SmallCheck tests"

[ SC.testProperty "Negation" negation
]
]

main :: IO ()
main = defaultMain suite

$ runhaskell TestSuite.hs
Unit tests
Units
Equality: OK
Assertion: OK
QuickCheck tests
Quickcheck test: OK
+++ OK, passed 100 tests.
SmallCheck tests
Negation: OK
11 tests completed

Silently
Often in the process of testing IO heavy code we’ll need to redirect stdout to compare it some known quantity. The
silently package allows us to capture anything done to stdout across any library inside of IO block and return the
result to the test runner.

capture :: IO a -> IO (String, a)

import Test.Tasty
import Test.Tasty.HUnit
import System.IO.Silently

test :: Int -> IO ()

test n = print (n * n)

testCapture n = do
(stdout, result) <- capture (test n)
assert (stdout == show (n*n) ++ "\n")

suite :: TestTree
suite = testGroup "Test Suite" [
testGroup "Units"
[ testCase "Equality" $ testCapture 10
]
]

main :: IO ()
TESTING 216

main = defaultMain suite

Chapter 16

Type Families

Type families are a powerful extension the Haskell type system, developed in 2005, that provide type­indexed data types
and named functions on types. This allows a whole new level of computation to occur at compile­time and opens an
entire arena of type­level abstractions that were previously impossible to express. Type families proved to be nearly as
fruitful as typeclasses and indeed, many previous approaches to type­level programming using classes are achieved much
more simply with type families.

MultiParam Typeclasses
Resolution of vanilla Haskell 98 typeclasses proceeds via very simple context reduction that minimizes interdependency
between predicates, resolves superclasses, and reduces the types to head normal form. For example:

(Eq [a], Ord [a]) => [a]

==> Ord a => [a]

If a single parameter typeclass expresses a property of a type ( i.e. whether it’s in a class or not in class ) then a multipa­
rameter typeclass expresses relationships between types. For example if we wanted to express the relation that a type can
be converted to another type we might use a class like:

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

import Data.Char

class Convertible a b where

convert :: a -> b

instance Convertible Int Integer where

convert = toInteger

instance Convertible Int Char where

convert = chr

instance Convertible Char Int where

convert = ord

Of course now our instances for Convertible Int are not unique anymore, so there no longer exists a nice procedure
for determining the inferred type of b from just a . To remedy this let’s add a functional dependency a -> b , which

217
TYPE FAMILIES 218

tells GHC that an instance a uniquely determines the instance that b can be. So we’ll see that our two instances relating
Int to both Integer and Char conflict.

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FunctionalDependencies #-}

import Data.Char

class Convertible a b | a -> b where

convert :: a -> b

instance Convertible Int Char where

convert = chr

instance Convertible Char Int where

convert = ord

Functional dependencies conflict between instance declarations:

instance Convertible Int Integer
instance Convertible Int Char

Now there’s a simpler procedure for determining instances uniquely and multiparameter typeclasses become more usable
and inferable again. Effectively a functional dependency | a -> b says that we can’t define multiple multiparamater
typeclass instances with the same a but different b .

λ: convert (42 :: Int)

'*'
λ: convert '*'
42

Now let’s make things not so simple. Turning on UndecidableInstances loosens the constraint on context reduction
that can only allow constraints of the class to become structural smaller than its head. As a result implicit computation
can now occur within in the type class instance search. Combined with a type­level representation of Peano numbers we
find that we can encode basic arithmetic at the type­level.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FunctionalDependencies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

data Z
data S n

type Zero = Z
type One = S Zero
type Two = S One
type Three = S Two
type Four = S Three
219 TYPE FAMILIES

zero :: Zero
zero = undefined

one :: One
one = undefined

two :: Two
two = undefined

three :: Three
three = undefined

four :: Four
four = undefined

class Eval a where

eval :: a -> Int

instance Eval Zero where

eval _ = 0

instance Eval n => Eval (S n) where

eval m = 1 + eval (prev m)

class Pred a b | a -> b where

prev :: a -> b

instance Pred Zero Zero where

prev = undefined

instance Pred (S n) n where

prev = undefined

class Add a b c | a b -> c where

add :: a -> b -> c

instance Add Zero a a where

add = undefined

instance Add a b c => Add (S a) b (S c) where

add = undefined

f :: Three
f = add one two

g :: S (S (S (S Z)))
g = add two two

h :: Int
h = eval (add three four)

If the typeclass contexts look similar to Prolog you’re not wrong, if one reads the contexts qualifier (=>) backwards as
turnstiles :- then it’s precisely the same equations.
TYPE FAMILIES 220

add(0, A, A).
add(s(A), B, s(C)) :- add(A, B, C).

pred(0, 0).
pred(S(A), A).

This is kind of abusing typeclasses and if used carelessly it can fail to terminate or overflow at compile­time.
UndecidableInstances shouldn’t be turned on without careful forethought about what it implies.

<interactive>:1:1:
Context reduction stack overflow; size = 201

Type Families
Type families allows us to write functions in the type domain which take types as arguments which can yield either types
or values indexed on their arguments which are evaluated at compile­time in during typechecking. Type families come
in two varieties: data families and type synonym families.
• type families are named function on types
• data families are type­indexed data types
First let’s look at type synonym families, there are two equivalent syntactic ways of constructing them. Either as associated
type families declared within a typeclass or as standalone declarations at the toplevel. The following forms are semantically
equivalent, although the unassociated form is strictly more general:

-- (1) Unassociated form

type family Rep a
type instance Rep Int = Char
type instance Rep Char = Int

class Convertible a where

convert :: a -> Rep a

instance Convertible Int where

convert = chr

instance Convertible Char where

convert = ord

-- (2) Associated form

class Convertible a where
type Rep a
convert :: a -> Rep a

instance Convertible Int where

type Rep Int = Char
convert = chr

instance Convertible Char where

221 TYPE FAMILIES

type Rep Char = Int

convert = ord

Using the same example we used for multiparameter + functional dependencies illustration we see that there is a di­
rect translation between the type family approach and functional dependencies. These two approaches have the same
expressive power.
An associated type family can be queried using the :kind! command in GHCi.

λ: :kind! Rep Int

Rep Int :: *
= Char
λ: :kind! Rep Char
Rep Char :: *
= Int

Data families on the other hand allow us to create new type parameterized data constructors. Normally we can only define
typeclasses functions whose behavior results in a uniform result which is purely a result of the typeclasses arguments. With
data families we can allow specialized behavior indexed on the type.
For example if we wanted to create more complicated vector structures ( bit­masked vectors, vectors of tuples, … ) that
exposed a uniform API but internally handled the differences in their data layout we can use data families to accomplish
this:

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import qualified Data.Vector.Unboxed as V

data family Array a

data instance Array Int = IArray (V.Vector Int)
data instance Array Bool = BArray (V.Vector Bool)
data instance Array (a,b) = PArray (Array a) (Array b)
data instance Array (Maybe a) = MArray (V.Vector Bool) (Array a)

class IArray a where

index :: Array a -> Int -> a

instance IArray Int where

index (IArray xs) i = xs V.! i

instance IArray Bool where

index (BArray xs) i = xs V.! i

-- Vector of pairs
instance (IArray a, IArray b) => IArray (a, b) where
index (PArray xs ys) i = (index xs i, index ys i)

-- Vector of missing values

instance (IArray a) => IArray (Maybe a) where
index (MArray bm xs) i =
case bm V.! i of
True -> Nothing
False -> Just $ index xs i
TYPE FAMILIES 222

Injectivity
The type level functions defined by type­families are not necessarily injective, the function may map two distinct input
types to the same output type. This differs from the behavior of type constructors ( which are also type­level functions )
which are injective.
For example for the constructor Maybe , Maybe t1 = Maybe t2 implies that t1 = t2 .

data Maybe a = Nothing | Just a

-- Maybe a ~ Maybe b implies a ~ b

type instance F Int = Bool

type instance F Char = Bool

-- F a ~ F b does not imply a ~ b, in general

Roles
Roles are a further level of specification for type variables parameters of datatypes.
• nominal
• representational
• phantom
They were added to the language to address a rather nasty and long­standing bug around the correspondence between a
newtype and its runtime representation. The fundamental distinction that roles introduce is there are two notions of type
equality. Two types are nominally equal when they have the same name. This is the usual equality in Haskell or Core.
Two types are representationally equal when they have the same representation. (If a type is higher­kinded, all nominally
equal instantiations lead to representationally equal types.)
• nominal ­ Two types are the same.
• representational ­ Two types have the same runtime representation.

{-# LANGUAGE GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving #-}

{-# LANGUAGE StandaloneDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

newtype Age = MkAge {unAge :: Int}

type family Inspect x

type instance Inspect Age = Int

type instance Inspect Int = Bool

class Boom a where

boom :: a -> Inspect a

instance Boom Int where

boom = (== 0)

deriving instance Boom Age

223 TYPE FAMILIES

-- GHC 7.6.3 exhibits undefined behavior

failure = boom (MkAge 3)
-- -6341068275333450897

Roles are normally inferred automatically, but with the RoleAnnotations extension they can be manually annotated.
Except in rare cases this should not be necessary although it is helpful to know what is going on under the hood.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE RoleAnnotations #-}

data Nat = Zero | Suc Nat

type role Vec nominal representational

data Vec :: Nat -> * -> * where
Nil :: Vec Zero a
(:*) :: a -> Vec n a -> Vec (Suc n) a

type role App representational nominal

data App (f :: k -> *) (a :: k) = App (f a)

type role Mu nominal nominal

data Mu (f :: (k -> *) -> k -> *) (a :: k) = Roll (f (Mu f) a)

type role Proxy phantom

data Proxy (a :: k) = Proxy

With:

coerce :: Coercible * a b => a -> b

class (~R#) k k a b => Coercible k a b

See:
• Data.Coerce
• Roles
• Roles: A New Feature of GHC

NonEmpty
Rather than having degenerate (and often partial) cases of many of the Prelude functions to accommodate the null case
of lists, it is sometimes preferable to statically enforce empty lists from even being constructed as an inhabitant of a type.

infixr 5 :|, <|

data NonEmpty a = a :| [a]

head :: NonEmpty a -> a

toList :: NonEmpty a -> [a]
fromList :: [a] -> NonEmpty a
TYPE FAMILIES 224

head :: NonEmpty a -> a

head ~(a :| _) = a

import Data.List.NonEmpty
import Prelude hiding (head, tail, foldl1)
import Data.Foldable (foldl1)

a :: NonEmpty Integer
a = fromList [1,2,3]
-- 1 :| [2,3]

b :: NonEmpty Integer
b = 1 :| [2,3]
-- 1 :| [2,3]

c :: NonEmpty Integer
c = fromList []
-- *** Exception: NonEmpty.fromList: empty list

d :: Integer
d = foldl1 (+) $ fromList [1..100]
-- 5050

Manual Proofs
One of most deep results in computer science, the Curry–Howard correspondence, is the relation that logical propositions
can be modeled by types and instantiating those types constitute proofs of these propositions. Programs are proofs and
proofs are programs.

Types Logic
A proposition
a : A proof
B(x) predicate
Void ⊥
Unit ⊤
A + B A∨B
A × B A∧B
A -> B A⇒B

In dependently typed languages we can exploit this result to its full extent, in Haskell we don’t have the strength that
dependent types provide but can still prove trivial results. For example, now we can model a type level function for
addition and provide a small proof that zero is an additive identity.

P 0 [ base step ]
∀n. P n → P (1+n) [ inductive step ]
-------------------
∀n. P(n)
225 TYPE FAMILIES

Axiom 1: a + 0 = a
Axiom 2: a + suc b = suc (a + b)

0 + suc a
= suc (0 + a) [by Axiom 2]
= suc a [Induction hypothesis]
■

Translated into Haskell our axioms are simply type definitions and recursing over the inductive datatype constitutes the
inductive step of our proof.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

data Z
data S n

data SNat n where

Zero :: SNat Z
Succ :: SNat n -> SNat (S n)

data Eql a b where

Refl :: Eql a a

type family Add m n

type instance Add Z n = n
type instance Add (S m) n = S (Add m n)

add :: SNat n -> SNat m -> SNat (Add n m)

add Zero m = m
add (Succ n) m = Succ (add n m)

cong :: Eql a b -> Eql (f a) (f b)

cong Refl = Refl

-- ∀n. 0 + suc n = suc n

plus_suc :: forall n. SNat n
-> Eql (Add Z (S n)) (S n)
plus_suc Zero = Refl
plus_suc (Succ n) = cong (plus_suc n)

-- ∀n. 0 + n = n
plus_zero :: forall n. SNat n
-> Eql (Add Z n) n
plus_zero Zero = Refl
plus_zero (Succ n) = cong (plus_zero n)

Using the TypeOperators extension we can also use infix notation at the type­level.
TYPE FAMILIES 226

data a :=: b where

Refl :: a :=: a

cong :: a :=: b -> (f a) :=: (f b)

cong Refl = Refl

type family (n :: Nat) :+ (m :: Nat) :: Nat

type instance Zero :+ m = m
type instance (Succ n) :+ m = Succ (n :+ m)

plus_suc :: forall n m. SNat n -> SNat m -> (n :+ (S m)) :=: (S (n :+ m))

plus_suc Zero m = Refl
plus_suc (Succ n) m = cong (plus_suc n m)

Constraint Kinds
GHC’s implementation also exposes the predicates that bound quantifiers in Haskell as types themselves, with the
-XConstraintKinds extension enabled. Using this extension we work with constraints as first class types.

Num :: * -> Constraint

Odd :: * -> Constraint

type T1 a = (Num a, Ord a)

The empty constraint set is indicated by () :: Constraint .

For a contrived example if we wanted to create a generic Sized class that carried with it constraints on the elements of
the container in question we could achieve this quite simply using type families.

{-# LANGUAGE ConstrainedClassMethods #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import Data.HashSet
import Data.Hashable
import GHC.Exts (Constraint)

type family Con a :: Constraint

type instance Con [a] = (Ord a, Eq a)

type instance Con (HashSet a) = (Hashable a)

class Sized a where

gsize :: Con a => a -> Int

instance Sized [a] where

gsize = length
227 TYPE FAMILIES

instance Sized (HashSet a) where

gsize = size

One use­case of this is to capture the typeclass dictionary constrained by a function and reify it as a value.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

import GHC.Exts (Constraint)

data Dict :: Constraint -> * where

Dict :: (c) => Dict c

dShow :: Dict (Show a) -> a -> String

dShow Dict x = show x

dEqNum :: Dict (Eq a, Num a) -> a -> Bool

dEqNum Dict x = x == 0

fShow :: String
fShow = dShow Dict 10

fEqual :: Bool
fEqual = dEqNum Dict 0

TypeFamilyDependencies
Type families historically have not been injective, i.e. they are not guaranteed to maps distinct elements of its arguments
to the same element of its result. The syntax is similar to the multiparmater typeclass functional dependencies in that the
resulting type is uniquely determined by a set of the type families parameters.

{-# LANGUAGE XTypeFamilyDependencies #-}

type family F a b c = (result :: k) | result -> a b c

type instance F Int Char Bool = Bool
type instance F Char Bool Int = Int
type instance F Bool Int Char = Char

See:
• Injective type families for Haskell
TYPE FAMILIES 228
Chapter 17

Promotion

Higher Kinded Types

What are higher kinded types?

The kind system in Haskell is unique by contrast with most other languages in that it allows datatypes to be constructed
which take types and type constructor to other types. Such a system is said to support higher kinded types.

All kind annotations in Haskell necessarily result in a kind * although any terms to the left may be higher­kinded
( * -> * ).

The common example is the Monad which has kind * -> * . But we have also seen this higher­kindedness in free
monads.

data Free f a where

Pure :: a -> Free f a
Free :: f (Free f a) -> Free f a

data Cofree f a where

Cofree :: a -> f (Cofree f a) -> Cofree f a

Free :: (* -> *) -> * -> *

Cofree :: (* -> *) -> * -> *

For instance Cofree Maybe a for some monokinded type a models a non­empty list with Maybe :: * -> * .

-- Cofree Maybe a is a non-empty list

testCofree :: Cofree Maybe Int
testCofree = (Cofree 1 (Just (Cofree 2 Nothing)))

Kind Polymorphism
The regular value level function which takes a function and applies it to an argument is universally generalized over in
the usual Hindley­Milner way.

229
PROMOTION 230

app :: forall a b. (a -> b) -> a -> b

app f a = f a

But when we do the same thing at the type­level we see we lose information about the polymorphism of the constructor
applied.

-- TApp :: (* -> *) -> * -> *

data TApp f a = MkTApp (f a)

Turning on -XPolyKinds allows polymorphic variables at the kind level as well.

-- Default: (* -> *) -> * -> *

-- PolyKinds: (k -> *) -> k -> *
data TApp f a = MkTApp (f a)

-- Default: ((* -> *) -> (* -> *)) -> (* -> *)

-- PolyKinds: ((k -> *) -> (k -> *)) -> (k -> *)
data Mu f a = Roll (f (Mu f) a)

-- Default: * -> *
-- PolyKinds: k -> *
data Proxy a = Proxy

Using the polykinded Proxy type allows us to write down type class functions over constructors of arbitrary kind arity.

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

data Proxy a = Proxy

data Rep = Rep

class PolyClass a where

foo :: Proxy a -> Rep
foo = const Rep

-- () :: *
-- [] :: * -> *
-- Either :: * -> * -> *

instance PolyClass ()
instance PolyClass []
instance PolyClass Either

For example we can write down the polymorphic S K combinators at the type level now.

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

newtype I (a :: *) = I a
newtype K (a :: *) (b :: k) = K a
231 PROMOTION

newtype Flip (f :: k1 -> k2 -> *) (x :: k2) (y :: k1) = Flip (f y x)

unI :: I a -> a
unI (I x) = x

unK :: K a b -> a
unK (K x) = x

unFlip :: Flip f x y -> f y x

unFlip (Flip x) = x

Data Kinds
The -XDataKinds extension allows us to refer to constructors at the value level and the type level. Consider a simple
sum type:

data S a b = L a | R b

-- S :: * -> * -> *
-- L :: a -> S a b
-- R :: b -> S a b

With the extension enabled we see that our type constructors are now automatically promoted so that L or R can be
viewed as both a data constructor of the type S or as the type L with kind S .

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

data S a b = L a | R b

-- S :: * -> * -> *
-- L :: * -> S * *
-- R :: * -> S * *

Promoted data constructors can referred to in type signatures by prefixing them with a single quote. Also of importance is
that these promoted constructors are not exported with a module by default, but type synonym instances can be created
for the ticked promoted types and exported directly.

data Foo = Bar | Baz

type Bar = 'Bar
type Baz = 'Baz

Combining this with type families we see we can write meaningful, type­level functions by lifting types to the kind level.

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

import Prelude hiding (Bool(..))

data Bool = False | True

PROMOTION 232

type family Not (a :: Bool) :: Bool

type instance Not True = False

type instance Not False = True

false :: Not True ~ False => a

false = undefined

true :: Not False ~ True => a

true = undefined

-- Fails at compile time.

-- Couldn't match type 'False with 'True
invalid :: Not True ~ True => a
invalid = undefined

Size­Indexed Vectors
Using this new structure we can create a Vec type which is parameterized by its length as well as its element type now
that we have a kind language rich enough to encode the successor type in the kind signature of the generalized algebraic
datatype.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

data Nat = Z | S Nat deriving (Eq, Show)

type Zero = Z
type One = S Zero
type Two = S One
type Three = S Two
type Four = S Three
type Five = S Four

data Vec :: Nat -> * -> * where

Nil :: Vec Z a
Cons :: a -> Vec n a -> Vec (S n) a

instance Show a => Show (Vec n a) where

show Nil = "Nil"
show (Cons x xs) = "Cons " ++ show x ++ " (" ++ show xs ++ ")"

class FromList n where

fromList :: [a] -> Vec n a

instance FromList Z where

fromList [] = Nil
233 PROMOTION

instance FromList n => FromList (S n) where

fromList (x:xs) = Cons x $ fromList xs

lengthVec :: Vec n a -> Nat

lengthVec Nil = Z
lengthVec (Cons x xs) = S (lengthVec xs)

zipVec :: Vec n a -> Vec n b -> Vec n (a,b)

zipVec Nil Nil = Nil
zipVec (Cons x xs) (Cons y ys) = Cons (x,y) (zipVec xs ys)

vec4 :: Vec Four Int

vec4 = fromList [0, 1, 2, 3]

vec5 :: Vec Five Int

vec5 = fromList [0, 1, 2, 3, 4]

example1 :: Nat
example1 = lengthVec vec4
-- S (S (S (S Z)))

example2 :: Vec Four (Int, Int)

example2 = zipVec vec4 vec4
-- Cons (0,0) (Cons (1,1) (Cons (2,2) (Cons (3,3) (Nil))))

So now if we try to zip two Vec types with the wrong shape then we get an error at compile­time about the off­by­one
error.

example2 = zipVec vec4 vec5

-- Couldn't match type 'S 'Z with 'Z
-- Expected type: Vec Four Int
-- Actual type: Vec Five Int

The same technique we can use to create a container which is statically indexed by an empty or non­empty flag, such
that if we try to take the head of an empty list we’ll get a compile­time error, or stated equivalently we have an obligation
to prove to the compiler that the argument we hand to the head function is non­empty.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

data Size = Empty | NonEmpty

data List a b where

Nil :: List Empty a
Cons :: a -> List b a -> List NonEmpty a
PROMOTION 234

head' :: List NonEmpty a -> a

head' (Cons x _) = x

example1 :: Int
example1 = head' (1 `Cons` (2 `Cons` Nil))

-- Cannot match type Empty with NonEmpty

example2 :: Int
example2 = head' Nil

Couldn't match type None with Many

Expected type: List NonEmpty Int
Actual type: List Empty Int

See:
• Giving Haskell a Promotion

Typelevel Numbers
GHC’s type literals can also be used in place of explicit Peano arithmetic.
GHC 7.6 is very conservative about performing reduction, GHC 7.8 is much less so and will can solve many typelevel
constraints involving natural numbers but sometimes still needs a little coaxing.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import GHC.TypeLits

data Vec :: Nat -> * -> * where

Nil :: Vec 0 a
Cons :: a -> Vec n a -> Vec (1 + n) a

-- GHC 7.6 will not reduce

-- vec3 :: Vec (1 + (1 + (1 + 0))) Int

vec3 :: Vec 3 Int

vec3 = 0 `Cons` (1 `Cons` (2 `Cons` Nil))

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

import GHC.TypeLits
import Data.Type.Equality
235 PROMOTION

data Foo :: Nat -> * where

Small :: (n <= 2) => Foo n
Big :: (3 <= n) => Foo n

Empty :: ((n == 0) ~ True) => Foo n

NonEmpty :: ((n == 0) ~ False) => Foo n

big :: Foo 10
big = Big

small :: Foo 2
small = Small

empty :: Foo 0
empty = Empty

nonempty :: Foo 3
nonempty = NonEmpty

See: Type­Level Literals

Typelevel Strings
Since GHC 8.0 we have been able to work with typelevel strings values represented at the typelevel as Symbol with
kind Symbol . The GHC.TypeLits module defines a set of a typeclases for lifting these values to and from the value
level and comparing and computing over the values at typelevel.

symbolVal :: forall n proxy. KnownSymbol n => proxy n -> String

type family AppendSymbol (m :: Symbol) (n :: Symbol) :: Symbol
type family CmpSymbol (m :: Symbol) (n :: Symbol) :: Ordering
sameSymbol :: (KnownSymbol a, KnownSymbol b) => Proxy a -> Proxy b -> Maybe (a :~: b)

These can be used to tag specific data at the typelevel with compile­time information encoded in the strings. For ex­
ample we can construct a simple unit system which allows us to attach units to numerical quantities and perform basic
dimensional analysis.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import GHC.TypeLits

data Tagged (l :: Symbol) a = Tag a

deriving (Show)

m :: Tagged "m" Double

m = Tag 10.0

s :: Tagged "s" Double

PROMOTION 236

s = Tag 20.0

divUnits ::
Fractional a =>
Tagged u1 a ->
Tagged u2 a ->
Tagged (u1 `AppendSymbol` u2) a
divUnits (Tag x) (Tag y) = Tag (x / y)

addUnits ::
(Num a, u1 `CmpSymbol` u2 ~ 'EQ) =>
Tagged u1 a ->
Tagged u2 a ->
Tagged u1 a
addUnits (Tag x) (Tag y) = Tag (x + y)

Custom Errors
As of GHC 8.0 we have the capacity to provide custom type error using type families. The messages themselves hook
into GHC and are expressed using the small datatype found in GHC.TypeLits

data ErrorMessage where

Text :: Symbol -> ErrorMessage
ShowType :: t -> ErrorMessage

-- Put two messages next to each other

(:<>:) :: ErrorMessage -> ErrorMessage -> ErrorMessage

-- Put two messages on top of each other

(:$$:) :: ErrorMessage -> ErrorMessage -> ErrorMessage

If one of these expressions is found in the signature of an expression GHC reports an error message of the form:

example.hs:1:1: error:
r My custom error message line 1.
r My custom error message line 2.
r In the expression: example
In an equation for ‘foo’: foo = ECoerce (EFloat 3) (EInt 4)

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import GHC.TypeLits

instance-- Error Message

TypeError
( Text "Equality is not defined for functions"
237 PROMOTION

:$$: (ShowType a :<>: Text " -> " :<>: ShowType b)

) =>
-- Instance head
Eq (a -> b)
where
(==) = undefined

-- Fail when we try to equate two functions

example = id == id

A less contrived example would be creating a type­safe embedded DSL that enforces invariants about the semantics at
the type­level. We’ve been able to do this sort of thing using GADTs and type­families for a while but the error reporting
has been horrible. With 8.0 we can have type­families that emit useful type errors that reflect what actually goes wrong
and integrate this inside of GHC.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import GHC.TypeLits

type family Coerce a b where

Coerce Int Int = Int
Coerce Float Float = Float
Coerce Int Float = Float
Coerce Float Int = TypeError (Text "Cannot cast to smaller type")

data Expr a where

EInt :: Int -> Expr Int
EFloat :: Float -> Expr Float
ECoerce :: Expr b -> Expr c -> Expr (Coerce b c)

foo :: Expr Int

foo = ECoerce (EFloat 3) (EInt 4)

Type Equality
Continuing with the theme of building more elaborate proofs in Haskell, GHC 7.8 recently shipped with the
Data.Type.Equality module which provides us with an extended set of type­level operations for expressing the
equality of types as values, constraints, and promoted booleans.

(~) :: k -> k -> Constraint

(==) :: k -> k -> Bool
(<=) :: Nat -> Nat -> Constraint
(<=?) :: Nat -> Nat -> Bool
(+) :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat
(-) :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat
(*) :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat
PROMOTION 238

(^) :: Nat -> Nat -> Nat

(:~:) :: k -> k -> *

Refl :: a1 :~: a1
sym :: (a :~: b) -> b :~: a
trans :: (a :~: b) -> (b :~: c) -> a :~: c
castWith :: (a :~: b) -> a -> b
gcastWith :: (a :~: b) -> (a ~ b => r) -> r

With this we have a much stronger language for writing restrictions that can be checked at a compile­time, and a mech­
anism that will later allow us to write more advanced proofs.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}

import GHC.TypeLits
import Data.Type.Equality

type Not a b = ((b == a) ~ False)

restrictUnit :: Not () a => a -> a

restrictUnit = id

restrictChar :: Not Char a => a -> a

restrictChar = id

Proxies
Using kind polymorphism with phantom types allows us to express the Proxy type which is inhabited by a single con­
structor with no arguments but with a polykinded phantom type variable which carries an arbitrary type.

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

-- | A concrete, poly-kinded proxy type

data Proxy t = Proxy

import Data.Proxy

a :: Proxy ()
a = Proxy

b :: Proxy 3
b = Proxy

c :: Proxy "symbol"
c = Proxy
239 PROMOTION

d :: Proxy Maybe
d = Proxy

e :: Proxy (Maybe ())

e = Proxy

In cases where we’d normally pass around a undefined as a witness of a typeclass dictionary, we can instead pass a
Proxy object which carries the phantom type without the need for the bottom. Using scoped type variables we can then
operate with the phantom parameter and manipulate wherever is needed.

t1 :: a
t1 = (undefined :: a)

t2 :: Proxy a
t2 Proxy :: Proxy a

Promoted Syntax
We’ve seen constructors promoted using DataKinds, but just like at the value­level GHC also allows us some syntactic
sugar for list and tuples instead of explicit cons’ing and pair’ing. This is enabled with the -XTypeOperators extension,
which introduces list syntax and tuples of arbitrary arity at the type­level.

data HList :: [*] -> * where

HNil :: HList '[]
HCons :: a -> HList t -> HList (a ': t)

data Tuple :: (*,*) -> * where

Tuple :: a -> b -> Tuple '(a,b)

Using this we can construct all variety of composite type­level objects.

λ: :kind 1
1 :: Nat

λ: :kind "foo"
"foo" :: Symbol

λ: :kind [1,2,3]
[1,2,3] :: [Nat]

λ: :kind [Int, Bool, Char]

[Int, Bool, Char] :: [*]

λ: :kind Just [Int, Bool, Char]

Just [Int, Bool, Char] :: Maybe [*]

λ: :kind '("a", Int)

(,) Symbol *
PROMOTION 240

λ: :kind [ '("a", Int), '("b", Bool) ]

[ '("a", Int), '("b", Bool) ] :: [(,) Symbol *]

Singleton Types
A singleton type is a type with a single value inhabitant. Singleton types can be constructed in a variety of ways using
GADTs or with data families.

data instance Sing (a :: Nat) where

SZ :: Sing 'Z
SS :: Sing n -> Sing ('S n)

data instance Sing (a :: Maybe k) where

SNothing :: Sing 'Nothing
SJust :: Sing x -> Sing ('Just x)

data instance Sing (a :: Bool) where

STrue :: Sing True
SFalse :: Sing False

Promoted Naturals

Value­level Type­level Models

SZ Sing 'Z 0
SS SZ Sing ('S 'Z) 1
SS (SS SZ) Sing ('S ('S 'Z)) 2

Promoted Booleans

Value­level Type­level Models

SFalse Sing 'False False
STrue Sing 'True True

Promoted Maybe

Value­level Type­level Models

SJust a Sing (SJust 'a) Just a
SNothing Sing Nothing Nothing

Singleton types are an integral part of the small cottage industry of faking dependent types in Haskell, i.e. constructing
types with terms predicated upon values. Singleton types are a way of “cheating” by modeling the map between types
and values as a structural property of the type.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}
241 PROMOTION

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE StandaloneDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import Data.Proxy
import GHC.Exts (Any)
import Prelude hiding (succ)

data Nat = Z | S Nat

-- kind-indexed data family

data family Sing (a :: k)

data instance Sing (a :: Nat) where

SZ :: Sing 'Z
SS :: Sing n -> Sing ('S n)

data instance Sing (a :: Maybe k) where

SNothing :: Sing 'Nothing
SJust :: Sing x -> Sing ('Just x)

data instance Sing (a :: Bool) where

STrue :: Sing True
SFalse :: Sing False

data Fin (n :: Nat) where

FZ :: Fin (S n)
FS :: Fin n -> Fin (S n)

data Vec a n where

Nil :: Vec a Z
Cons :: a -> Vec a n -> Vec a (S n)

class SingI (a :: k) where

sing :: Sing a

instance SingI Z where

sing = SZ

instance SingI n => SingI (S n) where

sing = SS sing

deriving instance Show Nat

deriving instance Show (SNat a)
deriving instance Show (SBool a)
deriving instance Show (Fin a)
PROMOTION 242

deriving instance Show a => Show (Vec a n)

type family (m :: Nat) :+ (n :: Nat) :: Nat where

Z :+ n = n
S m :+ n = S (m :+ n)

type SNat (k :: Nat) = Sing k

type SBool (k :: Bool) = Sing k
type SMaybe (b :: a) (k :: Maybe a) = Sing k

size :: Vec a n -> SNat n

size Nil = SZ
size (Cons x xs) = SS (size xs)

forget :: SNat n -> Nat

forget SZ = Z
forget (SS n) = S (forget n)

natToInt :: Integral n => Nat -> n

natToInt Z = 0
natToInt (S n) = natToInt n + 1

intToNat :: (Integral a, Ord a) => a -> Nat

intToNat 0 = Z
intToNat n = S $ intToNat (n - 1)

sNatToInt :: Num n => SNat x -> n

sNatToInt SZ = 0
sNatToInt (SS n) = sNatToInt n + 1

index :: Fin n -> Vec a n -> a

index FZ (Cons x _) = x
index (FS n) (Cons _ xs) = index n xs

test1 :: Fin (S (S (S Z)))

test1 = FS (FS FZ)

test2 :: Int
test2 = index FZ (1 `Cons` (2 `Cons` Nil))

test3 :: Sing ('Just ('S ('S Z)))

test3 = SJust (SS (SS SZ))

test4 :: Sing ('S ('S Z))

test4 = SS (SS SZ)

-- polymorphic constructor SingI

test5 :: Sing ('S ('S Z))
test5 = sing

The builtin singleton types provided in GHC.TypeLits have the useful implementation that type­level values can be
reflected to the value­level and back up to the type­level, albeit under an existential.
243 PROMOTION

someNatVal :: Integer -> Maybe SomeNat

someSymbolVal :: String -> SomeSymbol

natVal :: KnownNat n => proxy n -> Integer

symbolVal :: KnownSymbol n => proxy n -> String

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import Data.Proxy
import GHC.TypeLits

a :: Integer
a = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy 1)
-- 1

b :: String
b = symbolVal (Proxy :: Proxy "foo")
-- "foo"

c :: Integer
c = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (2 + 3))
-- 5

Closed Type Families

In the type families we’ve used so far (called open type families) there is no notion of ordering of the equations involved in
the type­level function. The type family can be extended at any point in the code resolution simply proceeds sequentially
through the available definitions. Closed type­families allow an alternative declaration that allows for a base case for the
resolution allowing us to actually write recursive functions over types.
For example consider if we wanted to write a function which counts the arguments in the type of a function and reifies
at the value­level.

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import Data.Proxy
import GHC.TypeLits

type family Count (f :: *) :: Nat where

Count (a -> b) = 1 + (Count b)
Count x = 1

type Fn1 = Int -> Int

type Fn2 = Int -> Int -> Int -> Int
PROMOTION 244

fn1 :: Integer
fn1 = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Count Fn1))
-- 2

fn2 :: Integer
fn2 = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Count Fn2))
-- 4

The variety of functions we can now write down are rather remarkable, allowing us to write meaningful logic at the type
level.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import GHC.TypeLits
import Data.Proxy
import Data.Type.Equality

-- Type-level functions over type-level lists.

type family Reverse (xs :: [k]) :: [k] where

Reverse '[] = '[]
Reverse xs = Rev xs '[]

type family Rev (xs :: [k]) (ys :: [k]) :: [k] where

Rev '[] i = i
Rev (x ': xs) i = Rev xs (x ': i)

type family Length (as :: [k]) :: Nat where

Length '[] = 0
Length (x ': xs) = 1 + Length xs

type family If (p :: Bool) (a :: k) (b :: k) :: k where

If True a b = a
If False a b = b

type family Concat (as :: [k]) (bs :: [k]) :: [k] where

Concat a '[] = a
Concat '[] b = b
Concat (a ': as) bs = a ': Concat as bs

type family Map (f :: a -> b) (as :: [a]) :: [b] where

Map f '[] = '[]
Map f (x ': xs) = f x ': Map f xs

type family Sum (xs :: [Nat]) :: Nat where

Sum '[] = 0
Sum (x ': xs) = x + Sum xs
245 PROMOTION

ex1 :: Reverse [1,2,3] ~ [3,2,1] => Proxy a

ex1 = Proxy

ex2 :: Length [1,2,3] ~ 3 => Proxy a

ex2 = Proxy

ex3 :: (Length [1,2,3]) ~ (Length (Reverse [1,2,3])) => Proxy a

ex3 = Proxy

-- Reflecting type level computations back to the value level.

ex4 :: Integer
ex4 = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Length (Concat [1,2,3] [4,5,6])))
-- 6

ex5 :: Integer
ex5 = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Sum [1,2,3]))
-- 6

-- Couldn't match type ‘2’ with ‘1’

ex6 :: Reverse [1,2,3] ~ [3,1,2] => Proxy a
ex6 = Proxy

The results of type family functions need not necessarily be kinded as (*) either. For example using Nat or Constraint
is permitted.

type family Elem (a :: k) (bs :: [k]) :: Constraint where

Elem a (a ': bs) = (() :: Constraint)
Elem a (b ': bs) = a `Elem` bs

type family Sum (ns :: [Nat]) :: Nat where

Sum '[] = 0
Sum (n ': ns) = n + Sum ns

Kind Indexed Type Families

Just as typeclasses are normally indexed on types, type families can also be indexed on kinds with the kinds given as
explicit kind signatures on type variables.

type family (a :: k) == (b :: k) :: Bool

type instance a == b = EqStar a b
type instance a == b = EqArrow a b
type instance a == b = EqBool a b

type family EqStar (a :: *) (b :: *) where

EqStar a a = True
EqStar a b = False

type family EqArrow (a :: k1 -> k2) (b :: k1 -> k2) where

EqArrow a a = True
EqArrow a b = False
PROMOTION 246

type family EqBool a b where

EqBool True True = True
EqBool False False = True
EqBool a b = False

type family EqList a b where

EqList '[] '[] = True
EqList (h1 ': t1) (h2 ': t2) = (h1 == h2) && (t1 == t2)
EqList a b = False

type family a && b where

True && True = True
a && a = False

HLists
A heterogeneous list is a cons list whose type statically encodes the ordered types of its values.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}

infixr 5 :::

data HList (ts :: [ * ]) where

Nil :: HList '[]
(:::) :: t -> HList ts -> HList (t ': ts)

-- Take the head of a non-empty list with the first value as Bool type.
headBool :: HList (Bool ': xs) -> Bool
headBool hlist = case hlist of
(a ::: _) -> a

hlength :: HList x -> Int

hlength Nil = 0
hlength (_ ::: b) = 1 + (hlength b)

tuple :: (Bool, (String, (Double, ())))

tuple = (True, ("foo", (3.14, ())))

hlist :: HList '[Bool, String , Double , ()]

hlist = True ::: "foo" ::: 3.14 ::: () ::: Nil

Of course this immediately begs the question of how to print such a list out to a string in the presence of type­
heterogeneity. In this case we can use type­families combined with constraint kinds to apply the Show over the HLists
parameters to generate the aggregate constraint that all types in the HList are Showable, and then derive the Show
instance.
247 PROMOTION

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import GHC.Exts (Constraint)

infixr 5 :::

data HList (ts :: [ * ]) where

Nil :: HList '[]
(:::) :: t -> HList ts -> HList (t ': ts)

type family Map (f :: a -> b) (xs :: [a]) :: [b]

type instance Map f '[] = '[]
type instance Map f (x ': xs) = f x ': Map f xs

type family Constraints (cs :: [Constraint]) :: Constraint

type instance Constraints '[] = ()
type instance Constraints (c ': cs) = (c, Constraints cs)

type AllHave (c :: k -> Constraint) (xs :: [k]) = Constraints (Map c xs)

showHList :: AllHave Show xs => HList xs -> [String]

showHList Nil = []
showHList (x ::: xs) = (show x) : showHList xs

instance AllHave Show xs => Show (HList xs) where

show = show . showHList

example1 :: HList '[Bool, String , Double , ()]

example1 = True ::: "foo" ::: 3.14 ::: () ::: Nil
-- ["True","\"foo\"","3.14","()"]

Typelevel Dictionaries
Much of this discussion of promotion begs the question whether we can create data structures at the type­level to store
information at compile­time. For example a type­level association list can be used to model a map between type­level
symbols and any other promotable types. Together with type­families we can write down type­level traversal and lookup
functions.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE RankNTypes #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
PROMOTION 248

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ConstraintKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import GHC.TypeLits
import Data.Proxy
import Data.Type.Equality

type family If (p :: Bool) (a :: k) (b :: k) :: k where

If True a b = a
If False a b = b

type family Lookup (k :: a) (ls :: [(a, b)]) :: Maybe b where

Lookup k '[] = 'Nothing
Lookup k ('(a, b) ': xs) = If (a == k) ('Just b) (Lookup k xs)

type M = [
'("a", 1)
, '("b", 2)
, '("c", 3)
, '("d", 4)
]

type K = "a"
type (!!) m (k :: Symbol) a = (Lookup k m) ~ Just a

value :: Integer
value = natVal ( Proxy :: (M !! "a") a => Proxy a )

If we ask GHC to expand out the type signature we can view the explicit implementation of the type­level map lookup
function.

(!!)
:: If
(GHC.TypeLits.EqSymbol "a" k)
('Just 1)
(If
(GHC.TypeLits.EqSymbol "b" k)
('Just 2)
(If
(GHC.TypeLits.EqSymbol "c" k)
('Just 3)
(If (GHC.TypeLits.EqSymbol "d" k) ('Just 4) 'Nothing)))
~ 'Just v =>
Proxy k -> Proxy v

Advanced Proofs
Now that we have the length­indexed vector let’s go write the reverse function, how hard could it be?
So we go and write down something like this:
249 PROMOTION

reverseNaive :: forall n a. Vec a n -> Vec a n

reverseNaive xs = go Nil xs -- Error: n + 0 != n
where
go :: Vec a m -> Vec a n -> Vec a (n :+ m)
go acc Nil = acc
go acc (Cons x xs) = go (Cons x acc) xs -- Error: n + succ m != succ (n + m)

Running this we find that GHC is unhappy about two lines in the code:

Couldn't match type ‘n’ with ‘n :+ 'Z’

Expected type: Vec a n
Actual type: Vec a (n :+ 'Z)

Could not deduce ((n1 :+ 'S m) ~ 'S (n1 :+ m))

Expected type: Vec a1 (k :+ m)
Actual type: Vec a1 (n1 :+ 'S m)

As we unfold elements out of the vector we’ll end up doing a lot of type­level arithmetic over indices as we combine the
subparts of the vector backwards, but as a consequence we find that GHC will run into some unification errors because
it doesn’t know about basic arithmetic properties of the natural numbers. Namely that forall n. n + 0 = 0 and
forall n m. n + (1 + m) = 1 + (n + m) . Which of course it really shouldn’t be given that we’ve constructed a
system at the type­level which intuitively models arithmetic but GHC is just a dumb compiler, it can’t automatically
deduce the isomorphism between natural numbers and Peano numbers.
So at each of these call sites we now have a proof obligation to construct proof terms. Recall from our discussion of
propositional equality from GADTs that we actually have such machinery to construct this now.

{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

import Data.Type.Equality

data Nat = Z | S Nat

data SNat n where

Zero :: SNat Z
Succ :: SNat n -> SNat (S n)

data Vec :: * -> Nat -> * where

Nil :: Vec a Z
Cons :: a -> Vec a n -> Vec a (S n)

instance Show a => Show (Vec a n) where

show Nil = "Nil"
show (Cons x xs) = "Cons " ++ show x ++ " (" ++ show xs ++ ")"

type family (m :: Nat) :+ (n :: Nat) :: Nat where

PROMOTION 250

Z :+ n = n
S m :+ n = S (m :+ n)

-- (a ~ b) implies (f a ~ f b)
cong :: a :~: b -> f a :~: f b
cong Refl = Refl

-- (a ~ b) implies (f a) implies (f b)
subst :: a :~: b -> f a -> f b
subst Refl = id

plus_zero :: forall n. SNat n -> (n :+ Z) :~: n

plus_zero Zero = Refl
plus_zero (Succ n) = cong (plus_zero n)

plus_suc :: forall n m. SNat n -> SNat m -> (n :+ (S m)) :~: (S (n :+ m))

plus_suc Zero m = Refl
plus_suc (Succ n) m = cong (plus_suc n m)

size :: Vec a n -> SNat n

size Nil = Zero
size (Cons _ xs) = Succ $ size xs

reverse :: forall n a. Vec a n -> Vec a n

reverse xs = subst (plus_zero (size xs)) $ go Nil xs
where
go :: Vec a m -> Vec a k -> Vec a (k :+ m)
go acc Nil = acc
go acc (Cons x xs) = subst (plus_suc (size xs) (size acc)) $ go (Cons x acc) xs

append :: Vec a n -> Vec a m -> Vec a (n :+ m)

append (Cons x xs) ys = Cons x (append xs ys)
append Nil ys = ys

vec :: Vec Int (S (S (S Z)))

vec = 1 `Cons` (2 `Cons` (3 `Cons` Nil))

test :: Vec Int (S (S (S Z)))

test = Main.reverse vec

One might consider whether we could avoid using the singleton trick and just use type­level natural numbers, and
technically this approach should be feasible although it seems that the natural number solver in GHC 7.8 can decide
some properties but not the ones needed to complete the natural number proofs for the reverse functions.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import Prelude hiding (Eq)

import GHC.TypeLits
251 PROMOTION

import Data.Type.Equality

type Z = 0

type family S (n :: Nat) :: Nat where

S n = n + 1

-- Yes!
eq_zero :: Z :~: Z
eq_zero = Refl

-- Yes!
zero_plus_one :: (Z + 1) :~: (1 + Z)
zero_plus_one = Refl

-- Yes!
plus_zero :: forall n. (n + Z) :~: n
plus_zero = Refl

-- Yes!
plus_one :: forall n. (n + S Z) :~: S n
plus_one = Refl

-- No.
plus_suc :: forall n m. (n + (S m)) :~: (S (n + m))
plus_suc = Refl

Caveat should be that there might be a way to do this in GHC 7.6 that I’m not aware of. In GHC 7.10 there are some
planned changes to solver that should be able to resolve these issues. In particular there are plans to allow pluggable type
system extensions that could outsource these kind of problems to third party SMT solvers which can solve these kind of
numeric relations and return this information back to GHC’s typechecker.
As an aside this is a direct transliteration of the equivalent proof in Agda, which is accomplished via the same method
but without the song and dance to get around the lack of dependent types.

module Vector where

infixr 10 _∷_

data N : Set where

zero : N
suc : N → N

{-# BUILTIN NATURAL N #-}

{-# BUILTIN ZERO zero #-}
{-# BUILTIN SUC suc #-}

infixl 6 _+_

_+_ : N → N → N
0 + n = n
suc m + n = suc (m + n)
PROMOTION 252

data Vec (A : Set) : N → Set where

[] : Vec A 0
_∷_ : ∀ {n} → A → Vec A n → Vec A (suc n)

_++_ : ∀ {A n m} → Vec A n → Vec A m → Vec A (n + m)

[] ++ ys = ys
(x ∷ xs) ++ ys = x ∷ (xs ++ ys)

infix 4 _≡_

data _≡_ {A : Set} (x : A) : A → Set where

refl : x ≡ x

subst : {A : Set} → (P : A → Set) → ∀{x y} → x ≡ y → P x → P y

subst P refl p = p

cong : {A B : Set} (f : A → B) → {x y : A} → x ≡ y → f x ≡ f y
cong f refl = refl

vec : ∀ {A} (k : N) → Set

vec {A} k = Vec A k

plus_zero : {n : N} → n + 0 ≡ n
plus_zero {zero} = refl
plus_zero {suc n} = cong suc plus_zero

plus_suc : {n : N} → n + (suc 0) ≡ suc n

plus_suc {zero} = refl
plus_suc {suc n} = cong suc (plus_suc {n})

reverse : ∀ {A n} → Vec A n → Vec A n

reverse [] = []
reverse {A} {suc n} (x ∷ xs) = subst vec (plus_suc {n}) (reverse xs ++ (x ∷ []))

Liquid Haskell
LiquidHaskell is an extension to GHC’s typesystem that adds the capacity for refinement types using the annotation
syntax. The type signatures of functions can be checked by the external for richer type semantics than default GHC
provides, including non­exhaustive patterns and complex arithmetic properties that require external SMT solvers to
verify. For instance LiquidHaskell can statically verify that a function that operates over a Maybe a is always given a
Just or that an arithmetic function always yields an Int that is an even positive number.

LiquidHaskell analyses the modules and discharges proof obligations to an SMT solver to see if the conditions are
satisfiable. This allows us to prove the absence of a family of errors around memory safety, arithmetic exceptions and
information flow.
You will need either the Microsoft Research Z3 SMT solver or Stanford CVC4 SMT solver.
For Linux:

sudo apt install z3 # z3

sudo apt install cvc4 # cvc4
253 PROMOTION

For Mac:

brew tap z3 # z3
brew tap cvc4/cvc4 # cvc4
brew install cvc4/cvc4/cvc4

Then install LiquidHaskell either with Cabal or Stack:

# Run one of the following

cabal install liquidhaskell
stack install liquidhaskell

Then with the LiquidHaskell framework installed you can annotate your Haskell modules with refinement types and run
the liquid

import Prelude hiding (mod, gcd)

{-@ mod :: a:Nat -> b:{v:Nat| 0 < v} -> {v:Nat | v < b} @-}
mod :: Int -> Int -> Int
mod a b
| a < b = a
| otherwise = mod (a - b) b

{-@ gcd :: a:Nat -> b:{v:Nat | v < a} -> Int @-}

gcd :: Int -> Int -> Int
gcd a 0 = a
gcd a b = gcd b (a `mod` b)

The module can be run through the solver using the liquid command line tool.

$ liquid example.hs
Done solving.

**** DONE: solve **************************************************************

**** DONE: annotate ***********************************************************

**** RESULT: SAFE **************************************************************

To run Liquid Haskell over a Cabal project you can include the cabal directory by passing cabaldir flag and then
including the source directory which contains your application code. You can specify additional specification for external
modules by including a spec folder containing special LH modules with definitions.
An example specification module.

module spec MySpec where

import GHC.Base
import GHC.Integer
PROMOTION 254

import Data.Foldable

assume length :: Data.Foldable.Foldable f => xs:f a -> {v:Nat | v = len xs}

To run the checker over your project:

$ liquid -f --cabaldir -i src -i spec src/*.hs

For more extensive documentation and further use cases see the official documentation:
• Liquid Haskell Documentation
Chapter 18

Generics

Haskell has several techniques for automatic generation of type classes for a variety of tasks that consist largely of boiler­
plate code generation such as:
• Pretty Printing
• Equality
• Serialization
• Ordering
• Traversals

Generic
The most modern method of doing generic programming uses type families to achieve a better method of deriving the
structural properties of arbitrary type classes. Generic implements a typeclass with an associated type Rep ( Represen­
tation ) together with a pair of functions that form a 2­sided inverse ( isomorphism ) for converting to and from the
associated type and the derived type in question.

class Generic a where

type Rep a
from :: a -> Rep a
to :: Rep a -> a

class Datatype d where

datatypeName :: t d f a -> String
moduleName :: t d f a -> String

class Constructor c where

conName :: t c f a -> String

GHC.Generics defines a set of named types for modeling the various structural properties of types in available in Haskell.

-- | Sums: encode choice between constructors

infixr 5 :+:
data (:+:) f g p = L1 (f p) | R1 (g p)

-- | Products: encode multiple arguments to constructors

infixr 6 :*:

255
GENERICS 256

data (:*:) f g p = f p :*: g p

-- | Tag for M1: datatype

data D
-- | Tag for M1: constructor
data C

-- | Constants, additional parameters and recursion of kind *

newtype K1 i c p = K1 { unK1 :: c }

-- | Meta-information (constructor names, etc.)

newtype M1 i c f p = M1 { unM1 :: f p }

-- | Type synonym for encoding meta-information for datatypes

type D1 = M1 D

-- | Type synonym for encoding meta-information for constructors

type C1 = M1 C

Using the deriving mechanics GHC can generate this Generic instance for us mechanically, if we were to write it by hand
for a simple type it might look like this:

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import GHC.Generics

data Animal
= Dog
| Cat

instance Generic Animal where

type
Rep Animal =
D1 ( 'MetaData "Animal" "Main" "main" 'False )
( C1 ( 'MetaCons "Dog" 'PrefixI 'False)
U1 :+: C1 ( 'MetaCons "Cat" 'PrefixI 'False) U1
)

from Dog = M1 (L1 (M1 U1))

from Cat = M1 (R1 (M1 U1))

to (M1 (L1 (M1 U1))) = Dog

to (M1 (R1 (M1 U1))) = Cat

data T_Animal -- Animal type

data C_Dog -- Dog Constructor
data C_Cat -- Cat Constructor

instance Datatype T_Animal where

datatypeName _ = "Animal"
257 GENERICS

moduleName _ = "Main"
packageName _ = "main"

instance Constructor C_Dog where

conName _ = "Dog"

instance Constructor C_Cat where

conName _ = "Cat"

Use kind! in GHCi we can look at the type family Rep associated with a Generic instance.

λ: :kind! Rep Animal

Rep Animal :: * -> *
= M1 D T_Animal (M1 C C_Dog U1 :+: M1 C C_Cat U1)

λ: :kind! Rep ()
Rep () :: * -> *
= M1 D GHC.Generics.D1() (M1 C GHC.Generics.C1_0() U1)

λ: :kind! Rep [()]

Rep [()] :: * -> *
= M1
D
GHC.Generics.D1[]
(M1 C GHC.Generics.C1_0[] U1
:+: M1
C
GHC.Generics.C1_1[]
(M1 S NoSelector (K1 R ()) :*: M1 S NoSelector (K1 R [()])))

Now the clever bit, instead writing our generic function over the datatype we instead write it over the Rep and then reify
the result using from . So for an equivalent version of Haskell’s default Eq that instead uses generic deriving we could
write:

class GEq' f where

geq' :: f a -> f a -> Bool

instance GEq' U1 where

geq' _ _ = True

instance (GEq c) => GEq' (K1 i c) where

geq' (K1 a) (K1 b) = geq a b

instance (GEq' a) => GEq' (M1 i c a) where

geq' (M1 a) (M1 b) = geq' a b

-- Equality for sums.

instance (GEq' a, GEq' b) => GEq' (a :+: b) where
geq' (L1 a) (L1 b) = geq' a b
geq' (R1 a) (R1 b) = geq' a b
geq' _ _ = False
GENERICS 258

-- Equality for products.

instance (GEq' a, GEq' b) => GEq' (a :*: b) where
geq' (a1 :*: b1) (a2 :*: b2) = geq' a1 a2 && geq' b1 b2

To accommodate the two methods of writing classes (generic­deriving or custom implementations) we can use the
DefaultSignatures extension to allow the user to leave typeclass functions blank and defer to Generic or to define
their own.

{-# LANGUAGE DefaultSignatures #-}

class GEq a where

geq :: a -> a -> Bool

default geq :: (Generic a, GEq' (Rep a)) => a -> a -> Bool
geq x y = geq' (from x) (from y)

Now anyone using our library need only derive Generic and create an empty instance of our typeclass instance without
writing any boilerplate for GEq .
Here is a complete example for deriving equality generics:

{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DefaultSignatures #-}

import GHC.Generics

-- Auxiliary class
class GEq' f where
geq' :: f a -> f a -> Bool

instance GEq' U1 where

geq' _ _ = True

instance (GEq c) => GEq' (K1 i c) where

geq' (K1 a) (K1 b) = geq a b

instance (GEq' a) => GEq' (M1 i c a) where

geq' (M1 a) (M1 b) = geq' a b

instance (GEq' a, GEq' b) => GEq' (a :+: b) where

geq' (L1 a) (L1 b) = geq' a b
geq' (R1 a) (R1 b) = geq' a b
geq' _ _ = False

instance (GEq' a, GEq' b) => GEq' (a :*: b) where

geq' (a1 :*: b1) (a2 :*: b2) = geq' a1 a2 && geq' b1 b2

--
class GEq a where
geq :: a -> a -> Bool
default geq :: (Generic a, GEq' (Rep a)) => a -> a -> Bool
259 GENERICS

geq x y = geq' (from x) (from y)

-- Base equalities
instance GEq Char where geq = (==)
instance GEq Int where geq = (==)
instance GEq Float where geq = (==)

-- Equalities derived from structure of (:+:) and (:*:)

instance GEq a => GEq (Maybe a)
instance (GEq a, GEq b) => GEq (a,b)

main :: IO ()
main = do
print $ geq 2 (3 :: Int)
print $ geq 'a' 'b'
print $ geq (Just 'a') (Just 'a')
print $ geq ('a','b') ('a', 'b')

See:
• Cooking Classes with Datatype Generic Programming
• Datatype­generic Programming in Haskell
• generic­deriving

Generic Deriving
Using Generics many common libraries provide a mechanisms to derive common typeclass instances. Some real world
examples:
The hashable library allows us to derive hashing functions.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

import GHC.Generics (Generic)

import Data.Hashable

data Color = Red | Green | Blue deriving (Generic, Show)

instance Hashable Color where

example1 :: Int
example1 = hash Red
-- 839657738087498284

example2 :: Int
example2 = hashWithSalt 0xDEADBEEF Red
-- 62679985974121021

The cereal library allows us to automatically derive a binary representation.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

GENERICS 260

import Data.Word
import Data.ByteString
import Data.Serialize

import GHC.Generics

data Val = A [Val] | B [(Val, Val)] | C

deriving (Generic, Show)

instance Serialize Val where

encoded :: ByteString
encoded = encode (A [B [(C, C)]])
-- "\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\SOH\SOH\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\NUL\SOH\STX\STX"

bytes :: [Word8]
bytes = unpack encoded
-- [0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,2,2]

decoded :: Either String Val

decoded = decode encoded

The aeson library allows us to derive JSON representations for JSON instances.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Data.Aeson
import GHC.Generics

data Point = Point { _x :: Double, _y :: Double }

deriving (Show, Generic)

instance FromJSON Point

instance ToJSON Point

example1 :: Maybe Point

example1 = decode "{\"x\":3.0,\"y\":-1.0}"

example2 = encode $ Point 123.4 20

See: A Generic Deriving Mechanism for Haskell

Higher Kinded Generics

Using the same interface GHC.Generics provides a separate typeclass for higher­kinded generics.

class Generic1 f where

type Rep1 f :: * -> *
from1 :: f a -> (Rep1 f) a
to1 :: (Rep1 f) a -> f a
261 GENERICS

So for instance Maybe has Rep1 of the form:

type instance Rep1 Maybe

= D1
GHC.Generics.D1Maybe
(C1 C1_0Maybe U1
:+: C1 C1_1Maybe (S1 NoSelector Par1))

Typeable
The Typeable class be used to create runtime type information for arbitrary types.

typeOf :: Typeable a => a -> TypeRep

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

import Data.Typeable

data Animal = Cat | Dog deriving Typeable

data Zoo a = Zoo [a] deriving Typeable

equal :: (Typeable a, Typeable b) => a -> b -> Bool

equal a b = typeOf a == typeOf b

example1 :: TypeRep
example1 = typeOf Cat
-- Animal

example2 :: TypeRep
example2 = typeOf (Zoo [Cat, Dog])
-- Zoo Animal

example3 :: TypeRep
example3 = typeOf ((1, 6.636e-34, "foo") :: (Int, Double, String))
-- (Int,Double,[Char])

example4 :: Bool
example4 = equal False ()
-- False

Using the Typeable instance allows us to write down a type safe cast function which can safely use unsafeCast and
provide a proof that the resulting type matches the input.

cast :: (Typeable a, Typeable b) => a -> Maybe b

cast x
| typeOf x == typeOf ret = Just ret
| otherwise = Nothing
where
ret = unsafeCast x
GENERICS 262

Of historical note is that writing our own Typeable classes is currently possible of GHC 7.6 but allows us to introduce
dangerous behavior that can cause crashes, and shouldn’t be done except by GHC itself. As of 7.8 GHC forbids hand­
written Typeable instances. As of 7.10 -XAutoDeriveTypeable is enabled by default.

See: Typeable and Data in Haskell

Dynamic Types
Since we have a way of querying runtime type information we can use this machinery to implement a Dynamic type.
This allows us to box up any monotype into a uniform type that can be passed to any function taking a Dynamic type
which can then unpack the underlying value in a type­safe way.

toDyn :: Typeable a => a -> Dynamic

fromDyn :: Typeable a => Dynamic -> a -> a
fromDynamic :: Typeable a => Dynamic -> Maybe a
cast :: (Typeable a, Typeable b) => a -> Maybe b

import Data.Dynamic
import Data.Maybe

dynamicBox :: Dynamic
dynamicBox = toDyn (6.62 :: Double)

example1 :: Maybe Int

example1 = fromDynamic dynamicBox
-- Nothing

example2 :: Maybe Double

example2 = fromDynamic dynamicBox
-- Just 6.62

example3 :: Int
example3 = fromDyn dynamicBox 0
-- 0

example4 :: Double
example4 = fromDyn dynamicBox 0.0
-- 6.62

In GHC 7.8 the Typeable class is poly­kinded so polymorphic functions can be applied over functions and higher kinded
types.

Use of Dynamic is somewhat rare, except in odd cases that have to deal with foreign memory and FFI interfaces. Using
it for business logic is considered a code smell. Consider a more idiomatic solution.

Data
Just as Typeable lets us create runtime type information, the Data class allows us to reflect information about the structure
of datatypes to runtime as needed.
263 GENERICS

class Typeable a => Data a where

gfoldl :: (forall d b. Data d => c (d -> b) -> d -> c b)
-> (forall g. g -> c g)
-> a
-> c a

gunfold :: (forall b r. Data b => c (b -> r) -> c r)

-> (forall r. r -> c r)
-> Constr
-> c a

toConstr :: a -> Constr

dataTypeOf :: a -> DataType
gmapQl :: (r -> r' -> r) -> r -> (forall d. Data d => d -> r') -> a -> r

The types for gfoldl and gunfold are a little intimidating ( and depend on RankNTypes ), the best way to understand
is to look at some examples. First the most trivial case a simple sum type Animal would produce the following code:

data Animal = Cat | Dog deriving Typeable

instance Data Animal where

gfoldl k z Cat = z Cat
gfoldl k z Dog = z Dog

gunfold k z c
= case constrIndex c of
1 -> z Cat
2 -> z Dog

toConstr Cat = cCat

toConstr Dog = cDog

dataTypeOf _ = tAnimal

tAnimal :: DataType
tAnimal = mkDataType "Main.Animal" [cCat, cDog]

cCat :: Constr
cCat = mkConstr tAnimal "Cat" [] Prefix

cDog :: Constr
cDog = mkConstr tAnimal "Dog" [] Prefix

For a type with non­empty containers we get something a little more interesting. Consider the list type:

instance Data a => Data [a] where

gfoldl _ z [] = z []
gfoldl k z (x:xs) = z (:) `k` x `k` xs

toConstr [] = nilConstr
GENERICS 264

toConstr (_:_) = consConstr

gunfold k z c
= case constrIndex c of
1 -> z []
2 -> k (k (z (:)))

dataTypeOf _ = listDataType

nilConstr :: Constr
nilConstr = mkConstr listDataType "[]" [] Prefix

consConstr :: Constr
consConstr = mkConstr listDataType "(:)" [] Infix

listDataType :: DataType
listDataType = mkDataType "Prelude.[]" [nilConstr,consConstr]

Looking at gfoldl we see the Data has an implementation of a function for us to walk an applicative over the elements
of the constructor by applying a function k over each element and applying z at the spine. For example look at the
instance for a 2­tuple as well:

instance (Data a, Data b) => Data (a,b) where

gfoldl k z (a,b) = z (,) `k` a `k` b

toConstr (_,_) = tuple2Constr

gunfold k z c
= case constrIndex c of
1 -> k (k (z (,)))

dataTypeOf _ = tuple2DataType

tuple2Constr :: Constr
tuple2Constr = mkConstr tuple2DataType "(,)" [] Infix

tuple2DataType :: DataType
tuple2DataType = mkDataType "Prelude.(,)" [tuple2Constr]

This is pretty neat, now within the same typeclass we have a generic way to introspect any Data instance and write
logic that depends on the structure and types of its subterms. We can now write a function which allows us to traverse
an arbitrary instance of Data and twiddle values based on pattern matching on the runtime types. So let’s write down a
function over which increments a Value type for both for n­tuples and lists.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

import Data.Data
import Control.Monad.Identity
import Control.Applicative

data Animal = Cat | Dog deriving (Data, Typeable)

265 GENERICS

newtype Val = Val Int deriving (Show, Data, Typeable)

incr :: Typeable a => a -> a

incr = maybe id id (cast f)
where f (Val x) = Val (x * 100)

over :: Data a => a -> a

over x = runIdentity $ gfoldl cont base (incr x)
where
cont k d = k <*> (pure $ over d)
base = pure

example1 :: Constr
example1 = toConstr Dog
-- Dog

example2 :: DataType
example2 = dataTypeOf Cat
-- DataType {tycon = "Main.Animal", datarep = AlgRep [Cat,Dog]}

example3 :: [Val]
example3 = over [Val 1, Val 2, Val 3]
-- [Val 100,Val 200,Val 300]

example4 :: (Val, Val, Val)

example4 = over (Val 1, Val 2, Val 3)
-- (Val 100,Val 200,Val 300)

We can also write generic operations, for example to count the number of parameters in a data type.

numHoles :: Data a => a -> Int

numHoles = gmapQl (+) 0 (const 1)

example1 :: Int
example1 = numHoles (1,2,3,4,5,6,7)
-- 7

example2 :: Int
example2 = numHoles (Just 3)
-- 1

Uniplate
Uniplate is a generics library for writing traversals and transformation for arbitrary data structures. It is extremely useful
for writing AST transformations and rewriting systems.

plate :: from -> Type from to

(|*) :: Type (to -> from) to -> to -> Type from to
(|-) :: Type (item -> from) to -> item -> Type from to
GENERICS 266

descend :: Uniplate on => (on -> on) -> on -> on

transform :: Uniplate on => (on -> on) -> on -> on
rewrite :: Uniplate on => (on -> Maybe on) -> on -> on

The descend function will apply a function to each immediate descendant of an expression and then combines them
up into the parent expression.
The transform function will perform a single pass bottom­up transformation of all terms in the expression.
The rewrite function will perform an exhaustive transformation of all terms in the expression to fixed point, using
Maybe to signify termination.

import Data.Generics.Uniplate.Direct

data Expr a
= Fls
| Tru
| Var a
| Not (Expr a)
| And (Expr a) (Expr a)
| Or (Expr a) (Expr a)
deriving (Show, Eq)

instance Uniplate (Expr a) where

uniplate (Not f) = plate Not |* f
uniplate (And f1 f2) = plate And |* f1 |* f2
uniplate (Or f1 f2) = plate Or |* f1 |* f2
uniplate x = plate x

simplify :: Expr a -> Expr a

simplify = transform simp
where
simp (Not (Not f)) = f
simp (Not Fls) = Tru
simp (Not Tru) = Fls
simp x = x

reduce :: Show a => Expr a -> Expr a

reduce = rewrite cnf
where
-- double negation
cnf (Not (Not p)) = Just p

-- de Morgan
cnf (Not (p `Or` q)) = Just $ (Not p) `And` (Not q)
cnf (Not (p `And` q)) = Just $ (Not p) `Or` (Not q)

-- distribute conjunctions
cnf (p `Or` (q `And` r)) = Just $ (p `Or` q) `And` (p `Or` r)
cnf ((p `And` q) `Or` r) = Just $ (p `Or` q) `And` (p `Or` r)
cnf _ = Nothing
267 GENERICS

example1 :: Expr String

example1 = simplify (Not (Not (Not (Not (Var "a")))))
-- Var "a"

example2 :: [String]
example2 = [a | Var a <- universe ex]
where
ex = Or (And (Var "a") (Var "b")) (Not (And (Var "c") (Var "d")))
-- ["a","b","c","d"]

example3 :: Expr String

example3 = reduce $ ((a `And` b) `Or` (c `And` d)) `Or` e
where
a = Var "a"
b = Var "b"
c = Var "c"
d = Var "d"
e = Var "e"

Alternatively Uniplate instances can be derived automatically from instances of Data without the need to explicitly write
a Uniplate instance. This approach carries a slight amount of overhead over an explicit hand­written instance.

import Data.Data
import Data.Typeable
import Data.Generics.Uniplate.Data

data Expr a
= Fls
| Tru
| Lit a
| Not (Expr a)
| And (Expr a) (Expr a)
| Or (Expr a) (Expr a)
deriving (Data, Typeable, Show, Eq)

Biplate

Biplates generalize plates where the target type isn’t necessarily the same as the source, it uses multiparameter typeclasses
to indicate the type sub of the sub­target. The Uniplate functions all have an equivalent generalized biplate form.

descendBi :: Biplate from to => (to -> to) -> from -> from
transformBi :: Biplate from to => (to -> to) -> from -> from
rewriteBi :: Biplate from to => (to -> Maybe to) -> from -> from

descendBiM :: (Monad m, Biplate from to) => (to -> m to) -> from -> m from
transformBiM :: (Monad m, Biplate from to) => (to -> m to) -> from -> m from
rewriteBiM :: (Monad m, Biplate from to) => (to -> m (Maybe to)) -> from -> m from

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
GENERICS 268

import Data.Generics.Uniplate.Direct

type Name = String

data Expr
= Var Name
| Lam Name Expr
| App Expr Expr
deriving Show

data Stmt
= Decl [Stmt]
| Let Name Expr
deriving Show

instance Uniplate Expr where

uniplate (Var x ) = plate Var |- x
uniplate (App x y) = plate App |* x |* y
uniplate (Lam x y) = plate Lam |- x |* y

instance Biplate Expr Expr where

biplate = plateSelf

instance Uniplate Stmt where

uniplate (Decl x ) = plate Decl ||* x
uniplate (Let x y) = plate Let |- x |- y

instance Biplate Stmt Stmt where

biplate = plateSelf

instance Biplate Stmt Expr where

biplate (Decl x) = plate Decl ||+ x
biplate (Let x y) = plate Let |- x |* y

rename :: Name -> Name -> Expr -> Expr

rename from to = rewrite f
where
f (Var a) | a == from = Just (Var to)
f (Lam a b) | a == from = Just (Lam to b)
f _ = Nothing

s, k, sk :: Expr
s = Lam "x" (Lam "y" (Lam "z" (App (App (Var "x") (Var "z")) (App (Var "y") (Var "z")))))
k = Lam "x" (Lam "y" (Var "x"))
sk = App s k

m :: Stmt
m = descendBi f $ Decl [ (Let "s" s) , Let "k" k , Let "sk" sk ]
where
f = rename "x" "a"
. rename "y" "b"
. rename "z" "c"
Chapter 19

Mathematics

Numeric Tower
Haskell’s numeric tower is unusual and the source of some confusion for novices. Haskell is one of the few languages to
incorporate statically typed overloaded literals without a mechanism for “coercions” often found in other languages.

To add to the confusion numerical literals in Haskell are desugared into a function from a numeric typeclass which
yields a polymorphic value that can be instantiated to any instance of the Num or Fractional typeclass at the call­site,
depending on the inferred type.

To use a blunt metaphor, we’re effectively placing an object in a hole and the size and shape of the hole defines the object
you place there. This is very different than in other languages where a numeric literal like 2.718 is hard coded in the
compiler to be a specific type ( double or something ) and you cast the value at runtime to be something smaller or larger
as needed.

42 :: Num a => a
fromInteger (42 :: Integer)

2.71 :: Fractional a => a

fromRational (2.71 :: Rational)

The numeric typeclass hierarchy is defined as such:

class Num a
class (Num a, Ord a) => Real a
class Num a => Fractional a
class (Real a, Enum a) => Integral a
class (Real a, Fractional a) => RealFrac a
class Fractional a => Floating a
class (RealFrac a, Floating a) => RealFloat a

269
MATHEMATICS 270

Conversions between concrete numeric types ( from : left column, to : top row ) is accomplished with several generic
functions.

Double Float Int Word Integer Rational

Double id fromRational truncate truncate truncate toRational
Float fromRational id truncate truncate truncate toRational
Int fromIntegral fromIntegral id fromIntegral fromIntegral fromIntegral
Word fromIntegral fromIntegral fromIntegral id fromIntegral fromIntegral
Integer fromIntegral fromIntegral fromIntegral fromIntegral id fromIntegral
Rational fromRational fromRational truncate truncate truncate id

GMP Integers
The Integer type in GHC is implemented by the GMP ( libgmp ) arbitrary precision arithmetic library. Unlike the
Int type, the size of Integer values is bounded only by the available memory.

λ: (2^64 :: Int)
0
λ: (2^64 :: Integer)
18446744073709551616

Most notably libgmp is one of the few libraries that compiled Haskell binaries are dynamically linked against. An
alternative library integer-simple can be linked in place of libgmp.
271 MATHEMATICS

Complex Numbers
Haskell supports arithmetic with complex numbers via a Complex datatype from the Data.Complex module. The
first argument is the real part, while the second is the imaginary part. The type has a single parameter and inherits its
numerical typeclass components (Num, Fractional, Floating) from the type of this parameter.

-- 1 + 2i
let complex = 1 :+ 2

data Complex a = a :+ a
mkPolar :: RealFloat a => a -> a -> Complex a

The Num instance for Complex is only defined if parameter of Complex is an instance of RealFloat .

λ: 0 :+ 1
0 :+ 1 :: Complex Integer

λ: (0 :+ 1) + (1 :+ 0)
1.0 :+ 1.0 :: Complex Integer

λ: exp (0 :+ 2 * pi)
1.0 :+ (-2.4492935982947064e-16) :: Complex Double

λ: mkPolar 1 (2*pi)
1.0 :+ (-2.4492935982947064e-16) :: Complex Double

λ: let f x n = (cos x :+ sin x)^n

λ: let g x n = cos (n*x) :+ sin (n*x)

Decimal & Scientific Types

Scientific provides arbitrary­precision numbers represented using scientific notation. The constructor takes an arbitrarily
sized Integer argument for the digits and an Int for the exponent. Alternatively the value can be parsed from a String or
coerced from either Double/Float.

scientific :: Integer -> Int -> Scientific

fromFloatDigits :: RealFloat a => a -> Scientific

import Data.Scientific

c , h, g, a, k :: Scientific
c = scientific 299792458 (0) -- Speed of light
h = scientific 662606957 (-42) -- Planck's constant
g = scientific 667384 (-16) -- Gravitational constant
a = scientific 729735257 (-11) -- Fine structure constant
k = scientific 268545200 (-9) -- Khinchin-Levy Constant

tau :: Scientific
MATHEMATICS 272

tau = fromFloatDigits (2 * pi)

maxDouble64 :: Double
maxDouble64 = read "1.7976931348623159e308"

-- Infinity

maxScientific :: Scientific
maxScientific = read "1.7976931348623159e308"
-- 1.7976931348623159e308

Polynomial Arithmetic
The standard library for working with symbolic polynomials is the poly library. It exposes a interface for working
with univariate polynomials which are backed by an efficient vector library. This allows us to efficiently manipulate and
perform arithmetic operations over univariate polynomails.
For example we can instantiate symbolic polynomials, write recurrence rules and generators over them and factor them.

import Data.Poly

abel :: VPoly Integer

abel = X ^ 5 - X + 1

fibPoly :: Integer -> VPoly Integer

fibPoly 0 = 0
fibPoly 1 = 1
fibPoly n = X * fibPoly (n - 1) + fibPoly (n - 2)

division :: (VPoly Double, VPoly Double)

division = gcdExt (X ^ 3 - 2 * X ^ 2 - 4) (X - 3)

See: poly

Combinatorics
Combinat is the standard Haskell library for doing combinatorial calculations. It provides a variety of functions for
computing:
• Permutations & Combinations
• Braid Groups
• Integer Partitions
• Young’s Tableux
• Lattice Paths
See: combinat

Number Theory
Arithmoi is the standard number theory library for Haskell. It provides functions for calculing common number theory
operations used in combinators and cryptography applications in Haskell. Including:
273 MATHEMATICS

• Modular square roots

• Möbius Inversions
• Primarily Testing
• Riemann Zeta Functions
• Pollard’s Rho Algorithm
• Jacobi symbols
• Meijer­G Functions

import Data.Maybe
import Math.NumberTheory.ArithmeticFunctions
import Math.NumberTheory.Moduli.Sqrt
import Math.NumberTheory.Primes
import Math.NumberTheory.Zeta

-- Riemann zeta function

exampleZeta :: Double
exampleZeta = zetas 1e-10 !! 10

-- Euler totient function

exampleEuler :: Integer
exampleEuler = totient 25

-- Ramanujan tau function

exampleRamanujan :: Integer
exampleRamanujan = ramanujan 16

-- Primality testing
examplePrimality :: Maybe (Prime Integer)
examplePrimality = isPrime 2147483647

-- Square roots moduluo prime

exampleSqrt :: [Integer]
exampleSqrt = sqrtsModPrime 42 (fromJust examplePrimality)

See: arithmoi

Stochastic Calculus
HQuantLib provides a variety of functions for working with stochastic processes. This primarily applies to stochas­
tic calculus applied to pricing financial products such as the Black­Scholes pricing engine and routines for calculating
volatility smiles of options products.
See: HQuantLib

Differential Equations
There are several Haskell libraries for finding numerical solutions to systems of differential equations. These kind of
problems show up quite frequently in scientific computing problems.
For example a simple differential equation is Van der Pol oscillator which occurs frequently in physics. This is a second
2
order differential equation which relates the position of a oscillator x in terms of time, acceleration ddt2x , and the velocity
dx
dt a scalar parameter µ. It is given by the equation.
MATHEMATICS 274

d2 x dx
− µ(1 − x2 ) + x = 0,
dt2 dt

For example this equation can be solved for a fixed µ and set of boundary conditions for the time parameter t. The
solution is returned as an HMatrix vector.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedLists #-}

module Main where

import Numeric.GSL.ODE
import Numeric.LinearAlgebra

-- Differential equation
f :: Double -> [Double] -> [Double]
f t [x, v] = [v, - x + mu * v * (1 - x ^ 2)]

-- Mu scalar, dampening strenth

mu :: Double
mu = 0.1

-- Boundary conditions
ts :: Vector Double
ts = linspace 1000 (0, 50)

-- Use default solver: Embedded Runge-Kutta-Fehlberg (4, 5) method.

vanderpol1 :: [Vector Double]
vanderpol1 = toColumns $ odeSolve f [1, 0] ts

-- Use Runge-Kutta (2,3) solver

vanderpol2 :: [Vector Double]
vanderpol2 = toColumns $ odeSolveV RK2 hi epsAbs epsRel (l2v f) [1, 0] ts
where
epsAbs = 1.49012e-08
epsRel = epsAbs
hi = (ts ! 1 - ts ! 0) / 100
l2v f = \t -> fromList . f t . toList

main :: IO ()
main = do
print vanderpol1
print vanderpol2

Statistics & Probability

Haskell has a basic statistics library for calculating descriptive statistics, generating and sampling probability distributions
and performing statistical tests.

import Data.Vector
import Statistics.Sample
275 MATHEMATICS

import Statistics.Distribution.Normal
import Statistics.Distribution.Poisson
import qualified Statistics.Distribution as S

s1 :: Vector Double
s1 = fromList [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]

s2 :: PoissonDistribution
s2 = poisson 2.5

s3 :: NormalDistribution
s3 = normalDistr mean stdDev
where
mean = 1
stdDev = 1

descriptive :: IO ()
descriptive = do
print $ range s1
-- 9.0
print $ mean s1
-- 5.5
print $ stdDev s1
-- 3.0276503540974917
print $ variance s1
-- 8.25
print $ harmonicMean s1
-- 3.414171521474055
print $ geometricMean s1
-- 4.5287286881167645

discrete :: IO ()
discrete = do
print $ S.cumulative s2 0
-- 8.208499862389884e-2
print $ S.mean s2
-- 2.5
print $ S.variance s2
-- 2.5
print $ S.stdDev s2
-- 1.5811388300841898

continuous :: IO ()
continuous = do
print $ S.cumulative s3 0
-- 0.15865525393145707
print $ S.quantile s3 0.5
-- 1.0
print $ S.density s3 0
-- 0.24197072451914334
print $ S.mean s3
-- 1.0
print $ S.variance s3
MATHEMATICS 276

-- 1.0
print $ S.stdDev s3
-- 1.0

Constructive Reals
Instead of modeling the real numbers on finite precision floating point numbers we alternatively work with Num which
internally manipulates the power series expansions for the expressions when performing operations like arithmetic or
transcendental functions without losing precision when performing intermediate computations. Then we simply slice
off a fixed number of terms and approximate the resulting number to a desired precision. This approach is not without
its limitations and caveats ( notably that it may diverge ).

exp(x) = 1 + x + 1/2*x^2 + 1/6*x^3 + 1/24*x^4 + 1/120*x^5 ...

sqrt(1+x) = 1 + 1/2*x - 1/8*x^2 + 1/16*x^3 - 5/128*x^4 + 7/256*x^5 ...
atan(x) = x - 1/3*x^3 + 1/5*x^5 - 1/7*x^7 + 1/9*x^9 - 1/11*x^11 ...
pi = 16 * atan (1/5) - 4 * atan (1/239)

import Data.Number.CReal

-- algebraic
phi :: CReal
phi = (1 + sqrt 5) / 2

-- transcendental
ramanujan :: CReal
ramanujan = exp (pi * sqrt 163)

main :: IO ()
main = do
putStrLn $ showCReal 30 pi
-- 3.141592653589793238462643383279
putStrLn $ showCReal 30 phi
-- 1.618033988749894848204586834366
putStrLn $ showCReal 15 ramanujan
-- 262537412640768743.99999999999925

SAT Solvers
A collection of constraint problems known as satisfiability problems show up in a number of different disciplines from
type checking to package management. Simply put a satisfiability problem attempts to find solutions to a statement of
conjoined conjunctions and disjunctions in terms of a series of variables. For example:
(A v ¬B v C) ∧ (B v D v E) ∧ (D v F)
To use the picosat library to solve this, it can be written as zero­terminated lists of integers and fed to the solver according
to a number­to­variable relation:

1 -2 3 -- (A v ¬B v C)
2 4 5 -- (B v D v E)
277 MATHEMATICS

4 6 -- (D v F)

import Picosat

main :: IO [Int]
main = do
solve [[1, -2, 3], [2,4,5], [4,6]]
-- Solution [1,-2,3,4,5,6]

The SAT solver itself can be used to solve satisfiability problems with millions of variables in this form and is finely tuned.
See:
• picosat

SMT Solvers
A generalization of the SAT problem to include predicates other theories gives rise to the very sophisticated domain of
“Satisfiability Modulo Theory” problems. The existing SMT solvers are very sophisticated projects ( usually bankrolled
by large institutions ) and usually have to be called out to via foreign function interface or via a common interface called
SMT­lib. The two most common of use in Haskell are cvc4 from Stanford and z3 from Microsoft Research.
The SBV library can abstract over different SMT solvers to allow us to express the problem in an embedded domain
language in Haskell and then offload the solving work to the third party library.
As an example, here’s how you can solve a simple cryptarithm

M O N A D
+ B U R R I T O
= B A N D A I D

using SBV library:

import Data.Foldable
import Data.SBV

-- | val [4,2] == 42
val :: [SInteger] -> SInteger
val = foldr1 (\d r -> d + 10*r) . reverse

puzzle :: Symbolic SBool

puzzle = do
ds@[b,u,r,i,t,o,m,n,a,d] <- sequenceA [ sInteger [v] | v <- "buritomnad" ]
constrain $ distinct ds
for_ ds $ \d -> constrain $ inRange d (0,9)
pure $ val [b,u,r,r,i,t,o]
+ val [m,o,n,a,d]
.== val [b,a,n,d,a,i,d]

Let’s look at all possible solutions,

MATHEMATICS 278

λ: allSat puzzle
Solution #1:
b = 4 :: Integer
u = 1 :: Integer
r = 5 :: Integer
i = 9 :: Integer
t = 7 :: Integer
o = 0 :: Integer
m = 8 :: Integer
n = 3 :: Integer
a = 2 :: Integer
d = 6 :: Integer
This is the only solution.
Chapter 20

Data Structures

Map
A map is an associative array mapping any instance of Ord keys to values of any type.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Lookup lookup O(log(n))
Insertion insert O(log(n))
Traversal traverse O(n)

import qualified Data.Map as Map

kv :: Map.Map Integer String

kv = Map.fromList [(1, "a"), (2, "b")]

lkup :: Integer -> String -> String

lkup key def =
case Map.lookup key kv of
Just val -> val
Nothing -> def

Tree
A tree is directed graph with a single root.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Lookup lookup O(log(n))
Insertion insert O(log(n))
Traversal traverse O(n)

279
DATA STRUCTURES 280

import Data.Tree

{-

A
/ \
B C
/ \
D E

-}

tree :: Tree String

tree = Node "A" [Node "B" [], Node "C" [Node "D" [], Node "E" []]]

postorder :: Tree a -> [a]

postorder (Node a ts) = elts ++ [a]
where elts = concat (map postorder ts)

preorder :: Tree a -> [a]

preorder (Node a ts) = a : elts
where elts = concat (map preorder ts)

ex1 = drawTree tree

ex2 = drawForest (subForest tree)
ex3 = flatten tree
ex4 = levels tree
ex5 = preorder tree
ex6 = postorder tree

Set
Sets are unordered data structures containing Ord values of any type and guaranteeing uniqueness with in the structure.
They are not identical to the mathematical notion of a Set even though they share the same namesake.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Insertion insert O(log(n))
Deletion delete O(log(n))
Traversal traverse O(n)
Membership Test member O(log(n))

import qualified Data.Set as Set

set :: Set.Set Integer

set = Set.fromList [1..1000]
281 DATA STRUCTURES

memtest :: Integer -> Bool

memtest elt = Set.member elt set

Vector
Vectors are high performance single dimensional arrays that come come in six variants, two for each of the following
types of a mutable and an immutable variant.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size length O(1)
Indexing (!) O(1)
Append append O(n)
Traversal traverse O(n)

• Data.Vector
• Data.Vector.Storable
• Data.Vector.Unboxed
The most notable feature of vectors is constant time memory access with ( (!) ) as well as variety of efficient map, fold
and scan operations on top of a fusion framework that generates surprisingly optimal code.

fromList :: [a] -> Vector a

toList :: Vector a -> [a]
(!) :: Vector a -> Int -> a
map :: (a -> b) -> Vector a -> Vector b
foldl :: (a -> b -> a) -> a -> Vector b -> a
scanl :: (a -> b -> a) -> a -> Vector b -> Vector a
zipWith :: (a -> b -> c) -> Vector a -> Vector b -> Vector c
iterateN :: Int -> (a -> a) -> a -> Vector a

import Data.Vector.Unboxed as V

norm :: Vector Double -> Double

norm = sqrt . V.sum . V.map (\x -> x*x)

example1 :: Double
example1 = norm $ V.iterateN 100000000 (+1) 0.0

Mutable Vectors
Mutable vectors are variants of vectors which allow inplace updates.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size length O(1)
Indexing (!) O(1)
DATA STRUCTURES 282

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Append append O(n)
Traversal traverse O(n)
Update modify O(1)
Read read O(1)
Write write O(1)

freeze :: MVector (PrimState m) a -> m (Vector a)

thaw :: Vector a -> MVector (PrimState m) a

Within the IO monad we can perform arbitrary read and writes on the mutable vector with constant time reads and
writes. When needed a static Vector can be created to/from the MVector using the freeze/thaw functions.

import GHC.Prim
import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.ST
import Control.Monad.Primitive

import Data.Vector.Unboxed (freeze)

import Data.Vector.Unboxed.Mutable
import qualified Data.Vector.Unboxed as V

example :: PrimMonad m => m (V.Vector Int)

example = do
v <- new 10
forM_ [0..9] $ \i ->
write v i (2*i)
freeze v

-- vector computation in IO
vecIO :: IO (V.Vector Int)
vecIO = example

-- vector computation in ST
vecST :: ST s (V.Vector Int)
vecST = example

main :: IO ()
main = do
vecIO >>= print
print $ runST vecST

The vector library itself normally does bounds checks on index operations to protect against memory corruption. This
can be enabled or disabled on the library level by compiling with boundschecks cabal flag.

Unordered Containers
Both the HashMap and HashSet are purely functional data structures that are drop in replacements for the
containers equivalents but with more efficient space and time performance. Additionally all stored elements must
283 DATA STRUCTURES

have a Hashable instance. These structures have different time complexities for insertions and lookups.

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Lookup lookup O(log(n))
Insertion insert O(log(n))
Traversal traverse O(n)

fromList :: (Eq k, Hashable k) => [(k, v)] -> HashMap k v

lookup :: (Eq k, Hashable k) => k -> HashMap k v -> Maybe v
insert :: (Eq k, Hashable k) => k -> v -> HashMap k v -> HashMap k v

import qualified Data.HashSet as S

import qualified Data.HashMap.Lazy as M

example1 :: M.HashMap Int Char

example1 = M.fromList $ zip [1..10] ['a'..]

example2 :: S.HashSet Int

example2 = S.fromList [1..10]

See: Announcing Unordered Containers

Hashtables
Hashtables provides hashtables with efficient lookup within the ST or IO monad. These have constant time lookup like
most languages:

Functionality Function Time Complexity

Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Lookup lookup O(1)
Insertion insert O(1) amortized
Traversal traverse O(n)

import Prelude hiding (lookup)

import Control.Monad.ST
import Data.HashTable.ST.Basic

-- Hashtable parameterized by ST "thread"

type HT s = HashTable s String String

set :: ST s (HT s)
set = do
DATA STRUCTURES 284

ht <- new
insert ht "key" "value1"
return ht

get :: HT s -> ST s (Maybe String)

get ht = do
val <- lookup ht "key"
return val

example :: Maybe String

example = runST (set >>= get)

new :: ST s (HashTable s k v)
insert :: (Eq k, Hashable k) => HashTable s k v -> k -> v -> ST s ()
lookup :: (Eq k, Hashable k) => HashTable s k v -> k -> ST s (Maybe v)

Graphs
The Graph module in the containers library is a somewhat antiquated API for working with directed graphs. A little bit
of data wrapping makes it a little more straightforward to use. The library is not necessarily well­suited for large graph­
theoretic operations but is perfectly fine for example, to use in a typechecker which needs to resolve strongly connected
components of the module definition graph.

import Data.Tree
import Data.Graph

data Grph node key = Grph

{ _graph :: Graph
, _vertices :: Vertex -> (node, key, [key])
}

fromList :: Ord key => [(node, key, [key])] -> Grph node key
fromList = uncurry Grph . graphFromEdges'

vertexLabels :: Functor f => Grph b t -> (f Vertex) -> f b

vertexLabels g = fmap (vertexLabel g)

vertexLabel :: Grph b t -> Vertex -> b

vertexLabel g = (\(vi, _, _) -> vi) . (_vertices g)

-- Topologically sort graph

topo' :: Grph node key -> [node]
topo' g = vertexLabels g $ topSort (_graph g)

-- Strongly connected components of graph

scc' :: Grph node key -> [[node]]
scc' g = fmap (vertexLabels g . flatten) $ scc (_graph g)

So for example we can construct a simple graph:

285 DATA STRUCTURES

ex1 :: [(String, String, [String])]

ex1 = [
("a","a",["b"]),
("b","b",["c"]),
("c","c",["a"])
]

ts1 :: [String]
ts1 = topo' (fromList ex1)
-- ["a","b","c"]

sc1 :: [[String]]
sc1 = scc' (fromList ex1)
-- [["a","b","c"]]

Or with two strongly connected subgraphs:

ex2 :: [(String, String, [String])]

ex2 = [
("a","a",["b"]),
("b","b",["c"]),
("c","c",["a"]),

("d","d",["e"]),
DATA STRUCTURES 286

("e","e",["f", "e"]),
("f","f",["d", "e"])
]

ts2 :: [String]
ts2 = topo' (fromList ex2)
-- ["d","e","f","a","b","c"]

sc2 :: [[String]]
sc2 = scc' (fromList ex2)
-- [["d","e","f"],["a","b","c"]]

See: GraphSCC

Graph Theory

The fgl library provides a more efficient graph structure and a wide variety of common graph­theoretic operations. For
example calculating the dominance frontier of a graph shows up quite frequently in control flow analysis for compiler
design.

import qualified Data.Graph.Inductive as G

cyc3 :: G.Gr Char String

cyc3 = G.buildGr
[([("ca",3)],1,'a',[("ab",2)]),
([],2,'b',[("bc",3)]),
([],3,'c',[])]

-- Loop query
ex1 :: Bool
ex1 = G.hasLoop x

-- Dominators
ex2 :: [(G.Node, [G.Node])]
ex2 = G.dom x 0

x :: G.Gr Int ()
x = G.insEdges edges gr
where
gr = G.insNodes nodes G.empty
edges = [(0,1,()), (0,2,()), (2,1,()), (2,3,())]
nodes = zip [0,1 ..] [2,3,4,1]
287 DATA STRUCTURES

DList
Functionality Function Time Complexity
Initialization empty O(1)
Size size O(1)
Lookup lookup O(log(n))
Insertion insert O(log(n))
Traversal traverse O(n)
Append (|>) O(1)
Prepend (<|) O(1)

A dlist is a list­like structure that is optimized for O(1) append operations, internally it uses a Church encoding of the
list structure. It is specifically suited for operations which are append­only and need only access it when manifesting the
entire structure. It is particularly well­suited for use in the Writer monad.

import Data.DList
import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.Writer

logger :: Writer (DList Int) ()

logger = replicateM_ 100000 $ tell (singleton 0)

Sequence
The sequence data structure behaves structurally similar to list but is optimized for append/prepend operations and
traversal.

import Data.Sequence

a :: Seq Int
a = fromList [1,2,3]

a0 :: Seq Int
a0 = a |> 4
DATA STRUCTURES 288

-- [1,2,3,4]

a1 :: Seq Int
a1 = 0 <| a
-- [0,1,2,3]
Chapter 21

FFI

Haskell does not exist in a vacuum and will quite often need to interact with or offload computation to another program­
ming language. Since GHC itself is built on the GCC ecosystem interfacing with libraries that can be linked via a C ABI
is quite natural. Indeed many high performance libraries will call out to Fortran, C, or C++ code to perform numerical
computations that can be linked seamlessly into the Haskell runtime. There are several approaches to combining Haskell
with other languages in the via the Foreign Function Interface or FFI.

Pure Functions
Wrapping pure C functions with primitive types is trivial.

/* $(CC) -c simple.c -o simple.o */

int example(int a, int b)

{
return a + b;
}

-- ghc simple.o simple_ffi.hs -o simple_ffi

{-# LANGUAGE ForeignFunctionInterface #-}

import Foreign.C.Types

foreign import ccall safe "example" example

:: CInt -> CInt -> CInt

main = print (example 42 27)

Storable Arrays
There exists a Storable typeclass that can be used to provide low­level access to the memory underlying Haskell values.
Ptr objects in Haskell behave much like C pointers although arithmetic with them is in terms of bytes only, not the
size of the type associated with the pointer ( this differs from C).
The Prelude defines Storable interfaces for most of the basic types as well as types in the Foreign.Storable module.

289
FFI 290

class Storable a where

sizeOf :: a -> Int
alignment :: a -> Int
peek :: Ptr a -> IO a
poke :: Ptr a -> a -> IO ()

To pass arrays from Haskell to C we can again use Storable Vector and several unsafe operations to grab a foreign pointer
to the underlying data that can be handed off to C. Once we’re in C land, nothing will protect us from doing evil things
to memory!

/* $(CC) -c qsort.c -o qsort.o */

void swap(int *a, int *b)
{
int t = *a;
*a = *b;
*b = t;
}

void sort(int *xs, int beg, int end)

{
if (end > beg + 1) {
int piv = xs[beg], l = beg + 1, r = end;

while (l < r) {
if (xs[l] <= piv) {
l++;
} else {
swap(&xs[l], &xs[--r]);
}
}

swap(&xs[--l], &xs[beg]);
sort(xs, beg, l);
sort(xs, r, end);
}
}

-- ghc qsort.o ffi.hs -o ffi

{-# LANGUAGE ForeignFunctionInterface #-}

import Foreign.Ptr
import Foreign.C.Types

import qualified Data.Vector.Storable as V

import qualified Data.Vector.Storable.Mutable as VM

foreign import ccall safe "sort" qsort

:: Ptr a -> CInt -> CInt -> IO ()

main :: IO ()
main = do
291 FFI

let vs = V.fromList ([1,3,5,2,1,2,5,9,6] :: [CInt])

v <- V.thaw vs
VM.unsafeWith v $ \ptr -> do
qsort ptr 0 9
out <- V.freeze v
print out

The names of foreign functions from a C specific header file can be qualified.

foreign import ccall unsafe "stdlib.h malloc"

malloc :: CSize -> IO (Ptr a)

Prepending the function name with a & allows us to create a reference to the function pointer itself.

foreign import ccall unsafe "stdlib.h &malloc"

malloc :: FunPtr a

Function Pointers
Using the above FFI functionality, it’s trivial to pass C function pointers into Haskell, but what about the inverse passing
a function pointer to a Haskell function into C using foreign import ccall "wrapper" .

#include <stdio.h>

void invoke(void (*fn)(int))

{
int n = 42;
printf("Inside of C, now we'll call Haskell.\n");
fn(n);
printf("Back inside of C again.\n");
}

{-# LANGUAGE ForeignFunctionInterface #-}

import Foreign
import System.IO
import Foreign.C.Types(CInt(..))

foreign import ccall "wrapper"

makeFunPtr :: (CInt -> IO ()) -> IO (FunPtr (CInt -> IO ()))

foreign import ccall "pointer.c invoke"

invoke :: FunPtr (CInt -> IO ()) -> IO ()

fn :: CInt -> IO ()
fn n = do
putStrLn "Hello from Haskell, here's a number passed between runtimes:"
print n
hFlush stdout
FFI 292

main :: IO ()
main = do
fptr <- makeFunPtr fn
invoke fptr

Will yield the following output:

Inside of C, now we'll call Haskell

Hello from Haskell, here's a number passed between runtimes:
42
Back inside of C again.

hsc2hs
When doing socket level programming, when handling UDP packets there is a packed C struct with a set of fields defined
by the Linux kernel. These fields are defined in the following C pseudocode.

struct msghdr {
void *msg_name; /* protocol address */
socklen_t msg_namelen; /* size of protocol address */
struct iovec *msg_iov; /* scatter/gather array */
int msg_iovlen; /* # elements in msg_iov */
void *msg_control; /* ancillary data (cmsghdr struct) */
socklen_t msg_controllen; /* length of ancillary data */
int msg_flags; /* flags returned by recvmsg() */
};

If we want to marshall packets to and from Haskell datatypes we need to be able to be able to take a pointer to memory
holding the packet message header and scan the memory into native Haskell types. This involves knowing some infor­
mation about the memory offsets for the packet structure. GHC ships with a tool known as hsc2hs which can be used
to read information from C header files to automatically generate the boilerplate instances of Storable to perform this
marshalling. The hsc2hs library acts a preprocessor over .hsc files and can fill in information as specific by several
macros to generate Haskell source.

#include <file.h>
#const <C_expression>
#peek <struct_type>, <field>
#poke <struct_type>, <field>

For example the following module from the network library must introspect the msghdr struct from
<sys/socket.h> .

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/socket.h>

import Network.Socket.Imports
import Network.Socket.Internal (zeroMemory)
import Network.Socket.Types (SockAddr)
293 FFI

import Network.Socket.ByteString.IOVec (IOVec)

data MsgHdr = MsgHdr

{ msgName :: !(Ptr SockAddr)
, msgNameLen :: !CUInt
, msgIov :: !(Ptr IOVec)
, msgIovLen :: !CSize
}

instance Storable MsgHdr where

sizeOf _ = (#const sizeof(struct msghdr))
alignment _ = alignment (undefined :: CInt)

peek p = do
name <- (#peek struct msghdr, msg_name) p
nameLen <- (#peek struct msghdr, msg_namelen) p
iov <- (#peek struct msghdr, msg_iov) p
iovLen <- (#peek struct msghdr, msg_iovlen) p
return $ MsgHdr name nameLen iov iovLen

poke p mh = do
zeroMemory p (#const sizeof(struct msghdr))
(#poke struct msghdr, msg_name) p (msgName mh)
(#poke struct msghdr, msg_namelen) p (msgNameLen mh)
(#poke struct msghdr, msg_iov) p (msgIov mh)
(#poke struct msghdr, msg_iovlen) p (msgIovLen mh)

Running the command line tool over this module we get the following Haskell output Example.hs . This can also be
run as part of a Cabal build step by including hsc2hs in your build-tools .

$ hsc2hs Example.hsc

import Network.Socket.ByteString.IOVec (IOVec)

import Network.Socket.Imports
import Network.Socket.Internal (zeroMemory)
import Network.Socket.Types (SockAddr)

data MsgHdr
= MsgHdr
{ msgName :: !(Ptr SockAddr),
msgNameLen :: !CUInt,
msgIov :: !(Ptr IOVec),
msgIovLen :: !CSize
}

instance Storable MsgHdr where

sizeOf _ = (56)
alignment _ = alignment (undefined :: CInt)
peek p = do
name <- ((\hsc_ptr -> peekByteOff hsc_ptr 0)) p
FFI 294

nameLen <- ((\hsc_ptr -> peekByteOff hsc_ptr 8)) p

iov <- ((\hsc_ptr -> peekByteOff hsc_ptr 16)) p
iovLen <- ((\hsc_ptr -> peekByteOff hsc_ptr 24)) p
return $ MsgHdr name nameLen iov iovLen

poke p mh = do
zeroMemory p (56)
((\hsc_ptr -> pokeByteOff hsc_ptr 0)) p (msgName mh)
((\hsc_ptr -> pokeByteOff hsc_ptr 8)) p (msgNameLen mh)
((\hsc_ptr -> pokeByteOff hsc_ptr 16)) p (msgIov mh)
((\hsc_ptr -> pokeByteOff hsc_ptr 24)) p (msgIovLen mh)
Chapter 22

Concurrency

GHC Haskell has an extremely advanced parallel runtime that embraces several different models of concurrency to adapt
to adapt to needs for different domains. Unlike other languages Haskell does not have any Global Interpreter Lock or
equivalent. Haskell code can be executed in a multi­threaded context and have shared mutable state and communication
channels between threads.
A thread in Haskell is created by forking off from the main process using the forkIO command. This is performed
within the IO monad and yields a ThreadId which can be used to communicate with the new thread.

forkIO :: IO () -> IO ThreadId

Haskell threads are extremely cheap to spawn, using only 1.5KB of RAM depending on the platform and are much
cheaper than a pthread in C. Calling forkIO 106 times completes just short of 1s. Additionally, functional purity in
Haskell also guarantees that a thread can almost always be terminated even in the middle of a computation without
concern.
See:
• The Scheduler
• Parallel and Concurrent Programming in Haskell

Sparks
The most basic “atom” of parallelism in Haskell is a spark. It is a hint to the GHC runtime that a computation can be
evaluated to weak head normal form in parallel.

rpar :: a -> Eval a

rseq :: Strategy a
rdeepseq :: NFData a => Strategy a

runEval :: Eval a -> a

rpar a spins off a separate spark that evaluates a to weak head normal form and places the computation in the spark
pool. When the runtime determines that there is an available CPU to evaluate the computation it will evaluate ( convert
) the spark. If the main thread of the program is the evaluator for the spark, the spark is said to have fizzled. Fizzling is
generally bad and indicates that the logic or parallelism strategy is not well suited to the work that is being evaluated.
The spark pool is also limited ( but user­adjustable ) to a default of 8000 (as of GHC 7.8.3 ). Sparks that are created
beyond that limit are said to overflow.

295
CONCURRENCY 296

-- Evaluates the arguments to f in parallel before application.

par2 f x y = x `rpar` y `rpar` f x y

An argument to rseq forces the evaluation of a spark before evaluation continues.

Action Description
Fizzled The resulting value has already been evaluated by the main thread so the spark need not be converted.
Dud The expression has already been evaluated, the computed value is returned and the spark is not converted.
GC'd The spark is added to the spark pool but the result is not referenced, so it is garbage collected.
Overflowed Insufficient space in the spark pool when spawning.

The parallel runtime is necessary to use sparks, and the resulting program must be compiled with -threaded . Ad­
ditionally the program itself can be specified to take runtime options with -rtsopts such as the number of cores to
use.

ghc -threaded -rtsopts program.hs

./program +RTS -s N8 -- use 8 cores

The runtime can be asked to dump information about the spark evaluation by passing the -s flag.

$ ./spark +RTS -N4 -s

Tot time (elapsed) Avg pause Max pause

Gen 0 5 colls, 5 par 0.02s 0.01s 0.0017s 0.0048s
Gen 1 3 colls, 2 par 0.00s 0.00s 0.0004s 0.0007s

Parallel GC work balance: 1.83% (serial 0%, perfect 100%)

TASKS: 6 (1 bound, 5 peak workers (5 total), using -N4)

SPARKS: 20000 (20000 converted, 0 overflowed, 0 dud, 0 GC'd, 0 fizzled)

The parallel computations themselves are sequenced in the Eval monad, whose evaluation with runEval is itself a
pure computation.

example :: (a -> b) -> a -> a -> (b, b)

example f x y = runEval $ do
a <- rpar $ f x
b <- rpar $ f y
rseq a
rseq b
return (a, b)

Threads
For fine­grained concurrency and parallelism, Haskell has a lightweight thread system that schedules logical threads on
the available operating system threads. These lightweight threads are called unbound threads, while native operating
systems are called bound threads since they are bound to a single operating system thread. The functions to spawn an
297 CONCURRENCY

run tasks inside these threads all live in the IO monad. The number of possible simultaneous threads is given by the
getNumCapabilities functions based on the system environment.

forkIO :: IO () -> IO ThreadId

forkOS :: IO () -> IO ThreadId
runInBoundThread :: IO a -> IO a
runInUnboundThread :: IO a -> IO a
getNumCapabilities :: IO Int
isCurrentThreadBound :: IO Bool

Managed threads work with the runtime system’s IO manager which will schedule and manage cooperative multitaksing
and polling. When a individual unbound thread is blocked polling on a file description or lock it will yield to another
runnable thread managed by the runtime. This yield action can also be explicitly invoked with the yield function. A
thread can also schedule a wait using threadDelay to yield to the scheduler for a fixed interval given in microseconds.

yield :: IO ()
threadDelay :: Int -> IO ()

Once a thread is forked the fork action will give back a ThreadId which can be used to call actions and kill the thread
from another context. Inside of a running thread the current ThreadId can be queried with myThreadId .

myThreadId :: IO ThreadId
killThread :: ThreadId -> IO ()

An exception can also be raised in a given ThreadId given an instance of Exception typeclass.

throwTo :: Exception e => ThreadId -> e -> IO ()

When individually polling on file descriptors there are several functions that can schedule the thread to wake up again
when the given file is given a wake event from the kernel. The following functions will yield the current thread waiting
on either a read or write event on the given file description Fd .

threadWaitRead :: Fd -> IO ()
threadWaitWrite :: Fd -> IO ()

IORef
IORef is a mutable reference that can be read and writen to within the IO monad. It is the simplest most low­level
mutable reference provided by the base library.

newIORef :: a -> IO (IORef a)

writeIORef :: IORef a -> a -> IO ()
readIORef :: IORef a -> IO a
modifyIORef' :: IORef a -> (a -> a) -> IO ()

For example we could construct two IORef s which mutably hold the balances for two imaginary bank accounts. These
references can be passed to another IO function which can update the values in place.
CONCURRENCY 298

import Data.IORef

example :: IO Integer
example = do
account1 <- newIORef 5000
account2 <- newIORef 1000
transfer 500 account1 account2
readIORef account1

transfer :: Integer -> IORef Integer -> IORef Integer -> IO ()

transfer n from to = do
modifyIORef from (+ (-n))
modifyIORef to (+ n)

There are also several atomic functions to update IORef when working with the threaded runtime.

atomicWriteIORef :: IORef a -> a -> IO ()

atomicModifyIORef :: IORef a -> (a -> (a, b)) -> IO b

The atomic modify function atomicModifyIORef reads the value of r and applies the function f to r giving back
(a',b) . Then value r is updated with the new value a' and b is the return value. Both the read and the write are
done atomically so it is not possible that any value will alter the underlying IORef between the read and write.
Normally IORef is garbage collected like any other value. Once it is out of scope and the runtime has no more
references to it, the runtime will collect the thunk holding the IORef as well as the value the underlying pointer points
at. Sometimes when working with these references will require adding additional finalisation logic.

mkWeakIORef :: IORef a -> IO () -> IO (Weak (IORef a))

The mkWeakIORef attaches a finalizer function in the second argument which is run when the value is garbage collected.

MVars
MVars are mutable references like IORefs that can be used to share mutable state between threads. An MVar has two
states empty and full. Reading from an empty MVar will block the current thread. Writing to a full MVar will also block
the current thread. Thus only one value can be held inside the MVar allowing us to synchronize the value across threads.
MVars are building blocks for many higher concurrent primitives which use them under the hood.
An MVar can either be initialised in an empty state or with a supplied value.

newEmptyMVar :: IO (MVar a)
newMVar :: a -> IO (MVar a)

The function takeMVar operates like a read returning the value, but once the value is read the state of the underlying
MVar is left empty. This read is performed once for the first thread to wake up polling for the read.

takeMVar :: MVar a -> IO a

putMVar :: MVar a -> a -> IO ()
readMVar :: MVar a -> IO a
299 CONCURRENCY

swapMVar :: MVar a -> a -> IO a

isEmptyMVar :: MVar a -> IO Bool

As an example consider a multithreaded scenario where a second thread is created which polls on atomically on an MVar
update.

import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Monad
import Prelude hiding (take)

take :: MVar [Char] -> IO ()

take m = forever $ do
x <- takeMVar m
putStrLn x

put :: MVar [Char] -> IO ()

put m = do
replicateM_ 10 $ do
threadDelay 100000
putMVar m "Value set."

example :: IO ()
example = do
m <- newEmptyMVar
forkIO (take m)
put m

If a thread is left sleeping waiting on an MVar and the runtime no longer has any references to code which can
write to the MRef (i.e. all references to the MVar are garbage collected) the thread will be thrown the exception
BlockedIndefinitelyOnMVar since no value can subsequently be written to it.

TVar
TVars are transactional mutable variables which can be read and written to within in the STM monad. The STM monad
provides support for Software Transactional Memory which is a higher level abstraction for concurrent communication
that doesn’t require explict thread maintenance and has lovely easy compositional nature.

The STM monad magically hooks into the runtime system and provides two key operations atomically and retry
which allow monadic blocks of STM actions to be performed atomically and passed around symbolically. In the event
that the runtime fails to commit a transaction, the retry function can rerun the logic contained in a STM a .

atomically :: STM a -> IO a

retry :: STM a

TVars can be created just like IORefs but instead of being in IO they can also be created with the STM monad.

newTVar :: a -> STM (TVar a)

newTVarIO :: a -> IO (TVar a)

Read, writes and updates proceed exactly like IORef updates but inside of STM.
CONCURRENCY 300

readTVar :: TVar a -> STM a

writeTVar :: TVar a -> a -> STM ()
modifyTVar :: TVar a -> (a -> a) -> STM ()

As an example consider the IORef account transfers from above, but instead the two modifyTVar actions are performed
atomically inside of the transfer function.

import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Concurrent.STM
import Control.Concurrent.STM.TVar

example :: IO Integer
example = do
account1 <- atomically $ newTVar 5000
account2 <- atomically $ newTVar 1000
atomically (transfer 500 account1 account2)
readTVarIO account1

transfer :: Integer -> TVar Integer -> TVar Integer -> STM ()
transfer n from to = do
modifyTVar from (+ (-n))
modifyTVar to (+ n)

There is an additional TMVar which behaves precisely like the traditional MVar (i.e. it has an empty and full state) but
which is embedded in IO. It is has precisely the same semantics as MVar but emits values within STM.

-- Control.Concurrent.STM.TMVar
newTMVar :: a -> STM (TMVar a)
putTMVar :: TMVar a -> a -> STM ()
takeTMVar :: TMVar a -> STM a

Chans
Channels are unbounded queues to which an unbounded number of values can be written an unbounded number of
times . Channels are implemented using MVars and can be consumed by any number of other threads which read data
off of the Chan. Channels are created, read from and written to using a simple new , read and write interface just
as we’ve seen with other concurrency primitives.

newChan :: IO (Chan a)
readChan :: Chan a -> IO a
writeChan :: Chan a -> a -> IO ()

An example in which a channel is created between a producer and consumer threads is shown below. This can be used
to share data between threads and create work queue background processing systems.

import System.IO
import Control.Monad
import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Concurrent.Chan
301 CONCURRENCY

producer :: Chan Integer -> IO ()

producer chan = forM_ [0 .. 1000] $ \i -> do
writeChan chan i
putStrLn "Writing to channel."

consumer :: Chan Integer -> IO ()

consumer chan = forever $ do
val <- readChan chan
thread <- myThreadId
putStrLn ("Recieved item in thread: " ++ show thread)
print val

example :: IO ()
example = do
chan <- newChan
forkIO (consumer chan)
forkIO (consumer chan)
forkIO (consumer chan)
forkIO (producer chan)
pure ()

main :: IO ()
main = do
hSetBuffering stdout LineBuffering
example

There is also an STM variant of Chan called TChan .

newTChan :: STM (TChan a)

readTChan :: TChan a -> STM a
writeTChan :: TChan a -> a -> STM ()

Semaphores
Semaphores are a concurrency primitive used to control access to a common resource used by multiple threads. A
semaphore is a variable containing an integral value that can be incremented or decremented by concurrent processes. A
semaphore will restrict concurrency to a integral count of consumers called the limit. The QSem provides an interface
for a simple lock semaphore that can be created in IO and polled on using waitQSem .

newQSem :: Int -> IO QSem

waitQSem :: QSem -> IO ()
signalQSem :: QSem -> IO ()

A simple example of usage:

import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Concurrent.QSem

task :: Integer -> QSem -> IO ()

CONCURRENCY 302

task index sem = do

waitQSem sem
forkIO $ putStrLn ("Thread: " ++ show index ++ "\n")
signalQSem sem

example :: IO ()
example = do
sem <- newQSem 1
forkIO (task 1 sem)
forkIO (task 2 sem)
forkIO (task 3 sem)
return ()

QSem also have a variant QSemN which allows a resource to be acquired and released in a fixed quantity other than one.
The waitQSemN function then takes an integral quantity to wait for.

newQSemN :: Int -> IO QSemN

waitQSemN :: QSemN -> Int -> IO ()

There is also an STM variant of QSem called TSem which has the same semantics.

newTSem :: Integer -> STM TSem

waitTSem :: TSem -> STM ()

Threadscope

Passing the flag -l generates the eventlog which can be rendered with the threadscope library.

$ ghc -O2 -threaded -rtsopts -eventlog Example.hs

$ ./program +RTS -N4 -l
$ threadscope Example.eventlog
303 CONCURRENCY

See:
• Performance profiling with ghc­events­analyze

Strategies
Sparks themselves form the foundation for higher level parallelism constructs known as strategies which adapt spark
creation to fit the computation or data structure being evaluated. For instance if we wanted to evaluate both elements of
a tuple in parallel we can create a strategy which uses sparks to evaluate both sides of the tuple.

type Strategy a = a -> Eval a

using :: a -> Strategy a -> a

import Control.Parallel.Strategies

parPair' :: Strategy (a, b)

parPair' (a, b) = do
a' <- rpar a
b' <- rpar b
return (a', b')

fib :: Int -> Int

fib 0 = 0
fib 1 = 1
fib n = fib (n-1) + fib (n-2)

serial :: (Int, Int)

serial = (fib 30, fib 31)

parallel :: (Int, Int)

parallel = runEval . parPair' $ (fib 30, fib 31)

This pattern occurs so frequently the combinator using can be used to write it equivalently in operator­like form that
CONCURRENCY 304

may be more visually appealing to some.

using :: a -> Strategy a -> a

x `using` s = runEval (s x)

parallel ::: (Int, Int)

parallel = (fib 30, fib 31) `using` parPair

For a less contrived example consider a parallel parmap which maps a pure function over a list of a values in parallel.

import Control.Parallel.Strategies

parMap' :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> Eval [b]

parMap' f [] = return []
parMap' f (a:as) = do
b <- rpar (f a)
bs <- parMap' f as
return (b:bs)

result :: [Int]
result = runEval $ parMap' (+1) [1..1000]

The functions above are quite useful, but will break down if evaluation of the arguments needs to be parallelized beyond
simply weak head normal form. For instance if the arguments to rpar is a nested constructor we’d like to parallelize
the entire section of work in evaluated the expression to normal form instead of just the outer layer. As such we’d like to
generalize our strategies so the evaluation strategy for the arguments can be passed as an argument to the strategy.
Control.Parallel.Strategies contains a generalized version of rpar which embeds additional evaluation logic
inside the rpar computation in Eval monad.

rparWith :: Strategy a -> Strategy a

Using the deepseq library we can now construct a Strategy variant of rseq that evaluates to full normal form.

rdeepseq :: NFData a => Strategy a

rdeepseq x = rseq (force x)

We now can create a “higher order” strategy that takes two strategies and itself yields a computation which when evaluated
uses the passed strategies in its scheduling.

import Control.DeepSeq
import Control.Parallel.Strategies

evalPair :: Strategy a -> Strategy b -> Strategy (a, b)

evalPair sa sb (a, b) = do
a' <- sa a
b' <- sb b
return (a', b')

parPair :: Strategy a -> Strategy b -> Strategy (a, b)

parPair sa sb = evalPair (rparWith sa) (rparWith sb)
305 CONCURRENCY

fib :: Int -> Int

fib 0 = 0
fib 1 = 1
fib n = fib (n-1) + fib (n-2)

serial :: ([Int], [Int])

serial = (a, b)
where
a = fmap fib [0..30]
b = fmap fib [1..30]

parallel :: ([Int], [Int])

parallel = (a, b) `using` evalPair rdeepseq rdeepseq
where
a = fmap fib [0..30]
b = fmap fib [1..30]

These patterns are implemented in the Strategies library along with several other general forms and combinators for
combining strategies to fit many different parallel computations.

parTraverse :: Traversable t => Strategy a -> Strategy (t a)

dot :: Strategy a -> Strategy a -> Strategy a
($||) :: (a -> b) -> Strategy a -> a -> b
(.||) :: (b -> c) -> Strategy b -> (a -> b) -> a -> c

See:
• Control.Concurent.Strategies

STM
Software transactional memory is a technique for demarcating blocks of atomic transactions that are guaranteed by the
runtime to have several properties:
• No parallel processes can read from the atomic block until the transaction commits.
• The current process is isolated cannot see any changes made by other parallel processes.
This is similar to the atomicity that databases guarantee. The stm library provides a lovely compositional interface
for building up higher level primitives that can be composed in atomic blocks to build safe concurrent logic without
worrying about deadlocks and memory corruption from threaded and mutable reference approaches to building parallel
algorithms.

atomically :: STM a -> IO a

orElse :: STM a -> STM a -> STM a
retry :: STM a

newTVar :: a -> STM (TVar a)

newTVarIO :: a -> IO (TVar a)
writeTVar :: TVar a -> a -> STM ()
readTVar :: TVar a -> STM a
CONCURRENCY 306

modifyTVar :: TVar a -> (a -> a) -> STM ()

modifyTVar' :: TVar a -> (a -> a) -> STM ()

The strength of Haskell’s purity guarantees that transactions within STM are pure and can always be rolled back if a
commit fails. An example of usage is shown below.

import Control.Monad
import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Concurrent.STM

type Account = TVar Double

transfer :: Account -> Account -> Double -> STM ()

transfer from to amount = do
available <- readTVar from
when (amount > available) retry

modifyTVar from (+ (-amount))

modifyTVar to (+ amount)

-- Threads are scheduled non-deterministically.

actions :: Account -> Account -> [IO ThreadId]
actions a b = map forkIO [
-- transfer to
atomically (transfer a b 10)
, atomically (transfer a b (-20))
, atomically (transfer a b 30)

-- transfer back
, atomically (transfer a b (-30))
, atomically (transfer a b 20)
, atomically (transfer a b (-10))
]

main :: IO ()
main = do
accountA <- atomically $ newTVar 60
accountB <- atomically $ newTVar 0

sequence_ (actions accountA accountB)

balanceA <- atomically $ readTVar accountA

balanceB <- atomically $ readTVar accountB

print $ balanceA == 60
print $ balanceB == 0

Monad Par
Using the Par monad we express our computation as a data flow graph which is scheduled in order of the connections
between forked computations which exchange resulting computations with IVar .
307 CONCURRENCY

new :: Par (IVar a)

put :: NFData a => IVar a -> a -> Par ()
get :: IVar a -> Par a
fork :: Par () -> Par ()
spawn :: NFData a => Par a -> Par (IVar a)

{-# LANGUAGE NoMonadFailDesugaring #-}

import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.Par

f , g :: Int -> Int

f x = x + 10
g x = x * 10

-- f x g x
-- \ /
-- a + b
-- / \
-- f (a+b) g (a+b)
-- \ /
-- (d,e)

example1 :: Int -> (Int, Int)

example1 x = runPar $ do
[a, b, c, d, e] <- replicateM 5 new
fork (put a (f x))
fork (put b (g x))
a' <- get a
CONCURRENCY 308

b' <- get b

fork (put c (a' + b'))
c' <- get c
fork (put d (f c'))
fork (put e (g c'))
d' <- get d
e' <- get e
return (d', e')

example2 :: [Int]
example2 = runPar $ do
xs <- parMap (+ 1) [1 .. 25]
return xs

-- foldr (+) 0 (map (^2) [1..xs])

example3 :: Int -> Int
example3 n = runPar $ do
let range = (InclusiveRange 1 n)
let mapper x = return (x ^ 2)
let reducer x y = return (x + y)
parMapReduceRangeThresh 10 range mapper reducer 0

Async
Async is a higher level set of functions that work on top of Control.Concurrent and STM.

async :: IO a -> IO (Async a)

wait :: Async a -> IO a
cancel :: Async a -> IO ()
concurrently :: IO a -> IO b -> IO (a, b)
race :: IO a -> IO b -> IO (Either a b)

import Control.Monad
import Control.Applicative
import Control.Concurrent
import Control.Concurrent.Async
import Data.Time

timeit :: IO a -> IO (a,Double)

timeit io = do
t0 <- getCurrentTime
a <- io
t1 <- getCurrentTime
return (a, realToFrac (t1 `diffUTCTime` t0))

worker :: Int -> IO Int

worker n = do
-- simulate some work
threadDelay (10^2 * n)
return (n * n)
309 CONCURRENCY

-- Spawn 2 threads in parallel, halt on both finished.

test1 :: IO (Int, Int)
test1 = do
val1 <- async $ worker 1000
val2 <- async $ worker 2000
(,) <$> wait val1 <*> wait val2

-- Spawn 2 threads in parallel, halt on first finished.

test2 :: IO (Either Int Int)
test2 = do
let val1 = worker 1000
let val2 = worker 2000
race val1 val2

-- Spawn 10000 threads in parallel, halt on all finished.

test3 :: IO [Int]
test3 = mapConcurrently worker [0..10000]

main :: IO ()
main = do
print =<< timeit test1
print =<< timeit test2
print =<< timeit test3
CONCURRENCY 310
Chapter 23

Parsing

Parser combinators were originally developed in the Haskell programming language and the last 10 years have seen a
massive amount of refinement and improvements on parser combinator libraries. Today Haskell has an amazing parser
ecosystem.

Parsec
For parsing in Haskell it is quite common to use a family of libraries known as Parser Combinators which let us write code
to generate parsers which construct themselves from an abstract description of the grammar described with combinators.

Combinators
<|> The choice operator tries to parse the first argument before proceeding to the second.
many Consumes an arbitrary number of expressions matching the given pattern and returns them as a list.
many1 Like many but requires at least one match.
optional Optionally parses a given pattern returning its value as a Maybe.
try Backtracking operator will let us parse ambiguous matching expressions and restart with a different pattern.

<|> can be chained sequentially to generate a sequence of options.

There are two styles of writing Parsec, one can choose to write with monads or with applicatives.

parseM :: Parser Expr

parseM = do
a <- identifier
char '+'
b <- identifier
return $ Add a b

The same code written with applicatives uses the applicative combinators:

-- | Sequential application.
(<*>) :: f (a -> b) -> f a -> f b

-- | Sequence actions, discarding the value of the first argument.

(*>) :: f a -> f b -> f b

311
PARSING 312

(*>) = liftA2 (const id)

-- | Sequence actions, discarding the value of the second argument.

(<*) :: f a -> f b -> f a
(<*) = liftA2 const

parseA :: Parser Expr

parseA = Add <$> identifier <* char '+' <*> identifier

Now for instance if we want to parse simple lambda expressions we can encode the parser logic as compositions of these
combinators which yield the string parser when evaluated with parse .

import Text.Parsec
import Text.Parsec.String

data Expr
= Var Char
| Lam Char Expr
| App Expr Expr
deriving Show

lam :: Parser Expr

lam = do
char '\\'
n <- letter
string "->"
e <- expr
return $ Lam n e

app :: Parser Expr

app = do
apps <- many1 term
return $ foldl1 App apps

var :: Parser Expr

var = do
n <- letter
return $ Var n

parens :: Parser Expr -> Parser Expr

parens p = do
char '('
e <- p
char ')'
return e

term :: Parser Expr

term = var <|> parens expr

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = lam <|> app
313 PARSING

decl :: Parser Expr

decl = do
e <- expr
eof
return e

test :: IO ()
test = parseTest decl "\\y->y(\\x->x)y"

main :: IO ()
main = test >>= print

Custom Lexer
In our previous example a lexing pass was not necessary because each lexeme mapped to a sequential collection of char­
acters in the stream type. If we wanted to extend this parser with a non­trivial set of tokens, then Parsec provides us with
a set of functions for defining lexers and integrating these with the parser combinators. The simplest example builds on
top of the builtin Parsec language definitions which define a set of most common lexical schemes.
For instance we’ll build on top of the empty language grammar on top of the haskellDef grammar that uses the Text
token instead of string.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Text.Parsec
import Text.Parsec.Text
import qualified Text.Parsec.Token as Tok
import qualified Text.Parsec.Language as Lang

import Data.Functor.Identity (Identity)

import qualified Data.Text as T
import qualified Data.Text.IO as TIO

data Expr
= Var T.Text
| App Expr Expr
| Lam T.Text Expr
deriving (Show)

lexer :: Tok.GenTokenParser T.Text () Identity

lexer = Tok.makeTokenParser style

style :: Tok.GenLanguageDef T.Text () Identity

style = Lang.emptyDef
{ Tok.commentStart = "{-"
, Tok.commentEnd = "-}"
, Tok.commentLine = "--"
, Tok.nestedComments = True
, Tok.identStart = letter
, Tok.identLetter = alphaNum <|> oneOf "_'"
, Tok.opStart = Tok.opLetter style
PARSING 314

, Tok.opLetter = oneOf ":!#$%&*+./<=>?@\\^|-~"

, Tok.reservedOpNames = []
, Tok.reservedNames = []
, Tok.caseSensitive = True
}

parens :: Parser a -> Parser a

parens = Tok.parens lexer

reservedOp :: T.Text -> Parser ()

reservedOp op = Tok.reservedOp lexer (T.unpack op)

ident :: Parser T.Text

ident = T.pack <$> Tok.identifier lexer

contents :: Parser a -> Parser a

contents p = do
Tok.whiteSpace lexer
r <- p
eof
return r

var :: Parser Expr

var = do
var <- ident
return (Var var )

app :: Parser Expr

app = do
e1 <- expr
e2 <- expr
return (App e1 e2)

fun :: Parser Expr

fun = do
reservedOp "\\"
binder <- ident
reservedOp "."
rhs <- expr
return (Lam binder rhs)

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = do
es <- many1 aexp
return (foldl1 App es)

aexp :: Parser Expr

aexp = fun <|> var <|> (parens expr)

test :: T.Text -> Either ParseError Expr

test = parse (contents expr) "<stdin>"

repl :: IO ()
315 PARSING

repl = do
str <- TIO.getLine
print (test str)
repl

main :: IO ()
main = repl

See: Text.Parsec.Language

Simple Parsing
Putting our lexer and parser together we can write down a more robust parser for our little lambda calculus syntax.

module Parser (parseExpr) where

import Text.Parsec
import Text.Parsec.String (Parser)
import Text.Parsec.Language (haskellStyle)

import qualified Text.Parsec.Expr as Ex

import qualified Text.Parsec.Token as Tok

type Id = String

data Expr
= Lam Id Expr
| App Expr Expr
| Var Id
| Num Int
| Op Binop Expr Expr
deriving (Show)

data Binop = Add | Sub | Mul deriving Show

lexer :: Tok.TokenParser ()
lexer = Tok.makeTokenParser style
where ops = ["->","\\","+","*","-","="]
style = haskellStyle {Tok.reservedOpNames = ops }

reservedOp :: String -> Parser ()

reservedOp = Tok.reservedOp lexer

identifier :: Parser String

identifier = Tok.identifier lexer

parens :: Parser a -> Parser a

parens = Tok.parens lexer

contents :: Parser a -> Parser a

contents p = do
PARSING 316

Tok.whiteSpace lexer
r <- p
eof
return r

natural :: Parser Integer

natural = Tok.natural lexer

variable :: Parser Expr

variable = do
x <- identifier
return (Var x)

number :: Parser Expr

number = do
n <- natural
return (Num (fromIntegral n))

lambda :: Parser Expr

lambda = do
reservedOp "\\"
x <- identifier
reservedOp "->"
e <- expr
return (Lam x e)

aexp :: Parser Expr

aexp = parens expr
<|> variable
<|> number
<|> lambda

term :: Parser Expr

term = Ex.buildExpressionParser table aexp
where infixOp x f = Ex.Infix (reservedOp x >> return f)
table = [[infixOp "*" (Op Mul) Ex.AssocLeft],
[infixOp "+" (Op Add) Ex.AssocLeft]]

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = do
es <- many1 term
return (foldl1 App es)

parseExpr :: String -> Expr

parseExpr input =
case parse (contents expr) "<stdin>" input of
Left err -> error (show err)
Right ast -> ast

main :: IO ()
main = getLine >>= print . parseExpr >> main

Trying it out:
317 PARSING

λ: runhaskell simpleparser.hs
1+2
Op Add (Num 1) (Num 2)

\i -> \x -> x
Lam "i" (Lam "x" (Var "x"))

\s -> \f -> \g -> \x -> f x (g x)

Lam "s" (Lam "f" (Lam "g" (Lam "x" (App (App (Var "f") (Var "x")) (App (Var "g") (Var "x"))))))

Megaparsec
Megaparsec is a generalisation of parsec which can work with the several input streams.
• Text (strict and lazy)
• ByteString (strict and lazy)
• String = [Char]
Megaparsec is an expanded and optimised form of parsec which can be used to write much larger complex parsers with
custom lexers and Clang­style error message handling.
An example below for the lambda calculus is quite concise:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Control.Monad.Combinators
import Data.Text (Text)
import Text.Megaparsec
import Text.Megaparsec.Char

type Parser = Parsec Expr Text

data Expr
= Var Char
| Lam Char Expr
| App Expr Expr
deriving (Eq, Ord, Show)

instance ShowErrorComponent Expr where

showErrorComponent = show

lam :: Parser Expr

lam = do
char '\\'
n <- letterChar
string "->"
e <- expr
return $ Lam n e

app :: Parser Expr

app = do
apps <- many term
PARSING 318

return $ foldl1 App apps

var :: Parser Expr

var = do
n <- letterChar
return $ Var n

parens :: Parser Expr -> Parser Expr

parens p = do
char '('
e <- p
char ')'
return e

term :: Parser Expr

term = var <|> parens expr

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = lam <|> app

decl :: Parser Expr

decl = do
e <- expr
eof
return e

example :: Text
example = "\\y->y(\\x->x)y"

main :: IO ()
main = case parse decl "<stdin>" example of
Left bundle -> putStr (errorBundlePretty bundle)
Right result -> print result

Attoparsec
Attoparsec is a parser combinator like Parsec but more suited for bulk parsing of large text and binary files instead of
parsing language syntax to ASTs. When written properly Attoparsec parsers can be efficient.
One notable distinction between Parsec and Attoparsec is that backtracking operator ( try ) is not present and reflects
on attoparsec’s different underlying parser model.
For a simple little lambda calculus language we can use attoparsec much in the same we used parsec:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# OPTIONS_GHC -fno-warn-unused-do-bind #-}

import Control.Applicative
import Data.Attoparsec.Text
import qualified Data.Text as T
import qualified Data.Text.IO as T
import Data.List (foldl1')
319 PARSING

data Name
= Gen Int
| Name T.Text
deriving (Eq, Show, Ord)

data Expr
= Var Name
| App Expr Expr
| Lam [Name] Expr
| Lit Int
| Prim PrimOp
deriving (Eq, Show)

data PrimOp
= Add
| Sub
| Mul
| Div
deriving (Eq, Show)

data Defn = Defn Name Expr

deriving (Eq, Show)

name :: Parser Name

name = Name . T.pack <$> many1 letter

num :: Parser Expr

num = Lit <$> signed decimal

var :: Parser Expr

var = Var <$> name

lam :: Parser Expr

lam = do
string "\\"
vars <- many1 (skipSpace *> name)
skipSpace *> string "->"
body <- expr
return (Lam vars body)

eparen :: Parser Expr

eparen = char '(' *> expr <* skipSpace <* char ')'

prim :: Parser Expr

prim = Prim <$> (
char '+' *> return Add
<|> char '-' *> return Sub
<|> char '*' *> return Mul
<|> char '/' *> return Div)

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = foldl1' App <$> many1 (skipSpace *> atom)
PARSING 320

atom :: Parser Expr

atom = try lam
<|> eparen
<|> prim
<|> var
<|> num

def :: Parser Defn

def = do
skipSpace
nm <- name
skipSpace *> char '=' *> skipSpace
ex <- expr
skipSpace <* char ';'
return $ Defn nm ex

file :: T.Text -> Either String [Defn]

file = parseOnly (many def <* skipSpace)

parseFile :: FilePath -> IO (Either T.Text [Defn])

parseFile path = do
contents <- T.readFile path
case file contents of
Left a -> return $ Left (T.pack a)
Right b -> return $ Right b

main :: IO (Either T.Text [Defn])

main = parseFile "simple.ml"

For an example try the above parser with the following simple lambda expression.

f = g (x - 1);
g = f (x + 1);
h = \x y -> (f x) + (g y);

Attoparsec adapts very well to binary and network protocol style parsing as well, this is extracted from a small imple­
mentation of a distributed consensus network protocol:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Control.Monad
import Data.Attoparsec.ByteString
import Data.Attoparsec.ByteString.Char8 as A
import Data.ByteString.Char8

data Action
= Success
| KeepAlive
| NoResource
| Hangup
| NewLeader
321 PARSING

| Election
deriving (Show)

newtype Sender = Sender ByteString

deriving (Show)

newtype Payload = Payload ByteString

deriving (Show)

data Message
= Message
{ action :: Action,
sender :: Sender,
payload :: Payload
}
deriving (Show)

proto :: Parser Message

proto = do
act <- paction
send <- Sender <$> A.takeTill (== '.')
body <- Payload <$> A.takeTill A.isSpace
endOfLine
return $ Message act send body

paction :: Parser Action

paction = do
c <- anyWord8
case c of
1 -> return Success
2 -> return KeepAlive
3 -> return NoResource
4 -> return Hangup
5 -> return NewLeader
6 -> return Election
_ -> mzero

main :: IO ()
main = do
let msgtext = "\x01\x6c\x61\x70\x74\x6f\x70\x2e\x33\x2e\x31\x34\x31\x35\x39\x32\x36\x35\x33\x35\x0A"
let msg = parseOnly proto msgtext
print msg

Configurator
Configurator is a library for configuring Haskell daemons and programs. It uses a simple, but flexible, configuration
language, supporting several of the most commonly needed types of data, along with interpolation of strings from the
configuration or the system environment.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

PARSING 322

import Data.Text
import qualified Data.Configurator as C

data Config = Config

{ verbose :: Bool
, loggingLevel :: Int
, logfile :: FilePath
, dbHost :: Text
, dbUser :: Text
, dbDatabase :: Text
, dbpassword :: Maybe Text
} deriving (Eq, Show)

readConfig :: FilePath -> IO Config

readConfig cfgFile = do
cfg <- C.load [C.Required cfgFile]
verbose <- C.require cfg "logging.verbose"
loggingLevel <- C.require cfg "logging.loggingLevel"
logFile <- C.require cfg "logging.logfile"
hostname <- C.require cfg "database.hostname"
username <- C.require cfg "database.username"
database <- C.require cfg "database.database"
password <- C.lookup cfg "database.password"
return $ Config verbose loggingLevel logFile hostname username database password

main :: IO ()
main = do
cfg <-readConfig "example.config"
print cfg

An example configuration file:

logging
{
verbose = true
logfile = "/tmp/app.log"
loggingLevel = 3
}

database
{
hostname = "us-east-1.rds.amazonaws.com"
username = "app"
database = "booktown"
password = "hunter2"
}

Configurator also includes an import directive allows the configuration of a complex application to be split across
several smaller files, or configuration data to be shared across several applications.
323 PARSING

Optparse Applicative

Optparse­applicative is a combinator library for building command line interfaces that take in various user flags, com­
mands and switches and maps them into Haskell data structures that can handle the input. The main interface is through
the applicative functor Parser and various combinators such as strArgument and flag which populate the option
parsing table with some monadic action which returns a Haskell value. The resulting sequence of values can be combined
applicatively into a larger Config data structure that holds all the given options. The --help header is also automatically
generated from the combinators.

./optparse
Usage: optparse.hs [filename...] [--quiet] [--cheetah]

Available options:
-h,--help Show this help text
filename... Input files
--quiet Whether to shut up.
--cheetah Perform task quickly.

import Data.List
import Data.Monoid
import Options.Applicative

data Opts = Opts

{ _files :: [String]
, _quiet :: Bool
, _fast :: Speed
}

data Speed = Slow | Fast

options :: Parser Opts

options = Opts <$> filename <*> quiet <*> fast
where
filename :: Parser [String]
filename = many $ argument str $
metavar "filename..."
<> help "Input files"

fast :: Parser Speed

fast = flag Slow Fast $
long "cheetah"
<> help "Perform task quickly."

quiet :: Parser Bool

quiet = switch $
long "quiet"
<> help "Whether to shut up."

greet :: Opts -> IO ()

greet (Opts files quiet fast) = do
putStrLn "reading these files:"
mapM_ print files
PARSING 324

case fast of
Fast -> putStrLn "quickly"
Slow -> putStrLn "slowly"

case quiet of
True -> putStrLn "quietly"
False -> putStrLn "loudly"

opts :: ParserInfo Opts

opts = info (helper <*> options) fullDesc

main :: IO ()
main = execParser opts >>= greet

Optparse Generic
Many optparse-applicative command line parsers can also be generated using Generics from descriptions of records.
This approach is not foolproof but works well enough for simple command line applications with a few options. For more
complex interfaces with subcommands and help information you’ll need to go back to the optparse-applicative
level. For example:

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveAnyClass #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

import Options.Generic

data Options = Options

{ verbose :: Bool <?> "Enable verbose mode"
, input :: FilePath <?> "Input file"
, output :: FilePath <?> "Output file"
}
deriving (Generic, Show, ParseRecord)

main :: IO ()
main = do
opts <- getRecord "My CLI"
print (opts :: Options)

Happy & Alex

Happy is a parser generator system for Haskell, similar to the tool ‘yacc’ for C. It works as a preprocessor with its own
syntax that generates a parse table from two specifications, a lexer file and parser file. Happy does not have the same
underlying parser implementation as parser combinators and can effectively work with left­recursive grammars without
explicit factorization. It can also easily be modified to track position information for tokens and handle offside parsing
rules for indentation­sensitive grammars. Happy is used in GHC itself for Haskell’s grammar.
1. Lexer.x
2. Parser.y
325 PARSING

Running the standalone commands will take Alex/Happy source files from stdin and generate and output Haskell mod­
ules. Alex and Happy files can contain arbitrary Haskell code that can be escaped to the output.

$ alex Lexer.x -o Lexer.hs

$ happy Parser.y -o Parser.hs

The generated modules are not human readable generally and unfortunately error messages are given in the Haskell
source, not the Happy source. Anything enclosed in braces is interpreted as literal Haskell while the code outside the
braces is interpeted as parser grammar.

-- This is Haskell
module Parser where

-- This is Happy
%tokentype { Lexeme Token }
%error { parseError }

%monad { Parse }

-- This is Haskell again

parseExpr :: String -> Either String [Expr]
parseExpr input =
let tokenStream = scanTokens input in
runExcept (expr tokenStream)
}

Happy and Alex can be integrated into a cabal file simply by including the Parser.y and Lexer.x files inside of the
exposed modules and adding them to the build­tools pragma.

exposed-modules: Parser, Lexer

build-tools: alex , happy

Lexer
For instance we could define a little toy lexer with a custom set of tokens.

{
module Lexer (
Token(..),
scanTokens
) where

import Syntax
}
PARSING 326

%wrapper "basic"

$digit = 0-9
$alpha = [a-zA-Z]
$eol = [\n]

tokens :-

-- Whitespace insensitive
$eol ;
$white+ ;
print { \s -> TokenPrint }
$digit+ { \s -> TokenNum (read s) }
\= { \s -> TokenEq }
$alpha [$alpha $digit \_ \']* { \s -> TokenSym s }

data Token
= TokenNum Int
| TokenSym String
| TokenPrint
| TokenEq
| TokenEOF
deriving (Eq,Show)

scanTokens :: String -> [Token]

scanTokens = alexScanTokens

Parser
The associated parser is list of a production rules and a monad to run the parser in. Production rules consist of a set of
options on the left and generating Haskell expressions on the right with indexed metavariables ( $1 , $2 , …) mapping
to the ordered terms on the left (i.e. in the second term term ~ $1 , term ~ $2 ).

terms
: term { [$1] }
| term terms { $1 : $2 }

An example parser module:

{
{-# LANGUAGE GeneralizedNewtypeDeriving #-}

module Parser (
parseExpr,
) where

import Lexer
327 PARSING

import Syntax

import Control.Monad.Except
}

%name expr
%tokentype { Token }
%monad { Except String } { (>>=) } { return }
%error { parseError }

%token
int { TokenNum $$ }
var { TokenSym $$ }
print { TokenPrint }
'=' { TokenEq }

%%

terms
: term { [$1] }
| term terms { $1 : $2 }

term
: var { Var $1 }
| var '=' int { Assign $1 $3 }
| print term { Print $2 }

parseError :: [Token] -> Except String a

parseError (l:ls) = throwError (show l)
parseError [] = throwError "Unexpected end of Input"

parseExpr :: String -> Either String [Expr]

parseExpr input =
let tokenStream = scanTokens input in
runExcept (expr tokenStream)
}

As a simple input consider the following simple program.

x = 4
print x
y = 5
print y
y = 6
print y
PARSING 328
Chapter 24

Streaming

Lazy IO
The problem with using the usual monadic approach to processing data accumulated through IO is that the Prelude tools
require us to manifest large amounts of data in memory all at once before we can even begin computation.

mapM :: (Monad m, Traversable t) => (a -> m b) -> t a -> m (t b)

sequence :: (Monad m, Traversable t) => t (m a) -> m (t a)

Reading from the file creates a thunk for the string that forced will then read the file. The problem is then that this
method ties the ordering of IO effects to evaluation order which is difficult to reason about in the large.
Consider that normally the monad laws ( in the absence of seq ) guarantee that these computations should be identical.
But using lazy IO we can construct a degenerate case.

import System.IO

main :: IO ()
main = do
withFile "foo.txt" ReadMode $ \fd -> do
contents <- hGetContents fd
print contents
-- "foo\n"

contents <- withFile "foo.txt" ReadMode hGetContents

print contents
-- ""

So what we need is a system to guarantee deterministic resource handling with constant memory usage. To that end both
the Conduits and Pipes libraries solved this problem using different ( though largely equivalent ) approaches.

Pipes

await :: Monad m => Pipe a y m a

yield :: Monad m => a -> Pipe x a m ()

329
STREAMING 330

(>->) :: Monad m
=> Pipe a b m r
-> Pipe b c m r
-> Pipe a c m r

runEffect :: Monad m => Effect m r -> m r

toListM :: Monad m => Producer a m () -> m [a]

Pipes is a stream processing library with a strong emphasis on the static semantics of composition. The simplest usage
is to connect “pipe” functions with a (>->) composition operator, where each component can await and yield to
push and pull values along the stream.

import Pipes
import Pipes.Prelude as P
import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.Identity

a :: Producer Int Identity ()

a = forM_ [1..10] yield

b :: Pipe Int Int Identity ()

b = forever $ do
x <- await
yield (x*2)
yield (x*3)
yield (x*4)

c :: Pipe Int Int Identity ()

c = forever $ do
x <- await
if (x `mod` 2) == 0
then yield x
else return ()

result :: [Int]
result = P.toList $ a >-> b >-> c

For example we could construct a “FizzBuzz” pipe.

{-# LANGUAGE MultiWayIf #-}

import Pipes
import qualified Pipes.Prelude as P

count :: Producer Integer IO ()

count = each [1..100]

fizzbuzz :: Pipe Integer String IO ()

fizzbuzz = do
n <- await
if | n `mod` 15 == 0 -> yield "FizzBuzz"
| n `mod` 5 == 0 -> yield "Fizz"
331 STREAMING

| n `mod` 3 == 0 -> yield "Buzz"

| otherwise -> return ()
fizzbuzz

main :: IO ()
main = runEffect $ count >-> fizzbuzz >-> P.stdoutLn

To continue with the degenerate case we constructed with Lazy IO, consider than we can now compose and sequence
deterministic actions over files without having to worry about effect order.

import Pipes
import Pipes.Prelude as P
import System.IO

readF :: FilePath -> Producer String IO ()

readF file = do
lift $ putStrLn $ "Opened" ++ file
h <- lift $ openFile file ReadMode
fromHandle h
lift $ putStrLn $ "Closed" ++ file
lift $ hClose h

main :: IO ()
main = runEffect $ readF "foo.txt" >-> P.take 3 >-> stdoutLn

This is a simple sampling of the functionality of pipes. The documentation for pipes is extensive and great deal of care
has been taken make the library extremely thorough. pipes is a shining example of an accessible yet category theoretic
driven design.

See: Pipes Tutorial

ZeroMQ
bracket :: MonadSafe m => Base m a -> (a -> Base m b) -> (a -> m c) -> m c

As a motivating example, ZeroMQ is a network messaging library that abstracts over traditional Unix sockets to a variety
of network topologies. Most notably it isn’t designed to guarantee any sort of transactional guarantees for delivery or
recovery in case of errors so it’s necessary to design a layer on top of it to provide the desired behavior at the application
layer.

In Haskell we’d like to guarantee that if we’re polling on a socket we get messages delivered in a timely fashion or consider
the resource in an error state and recover from it. Using pipes-safe we can manage the life cycle of lazy IO resources
and can safely handle failures, resource termination and finalization gracefully. In other languages this kind of logic would
be smeared across several places, or put in some global context and prone to introduce errors and subtle race conditions.
Using pipes we instead get a nice tight abstraction designed exactly to fit this kind of use case.

For instance now we can bracket the ZeroMQ socket creation and finalization within the SafeT monad transformer
which guarantees that after successful message delivery we execute the pipes function as expected, or on failure we halt
the execution and finalize the socket.
STREAMING 332

import Pipes
import Pipes.Safe
import qualified Pipes.Prelude as P

import System.Timeout (timeout)

import Data.ByteString.Char8
import qualified System.ZMQ as ZMQ

data Opts = Opts

{ _addr :: String -- ^ ZMQ socket address
, _timeout :: Int -- ^ Time in milliseconds for socket timeout
}

recvTimeout :: Opts -> ZMQ.Socket a -> Producer ByteString (SafeT IO) ()

recvTimeout opts sock = do
body <- liftIO $ timeout (_timeout opts) (ZMQ.receive sock [])
case body of
Just msg -> do
liftIO $ ZMQ.send sock msg []
yield msg
recvTimeout opts sock
Nothing -> liftIO $ print "socket timed out"

collect :: ZMQ.Context
-> Opts
-> Producer ByteString (SafeT IO) ()
collect ctx opts = bracket zinit zclose (recvTimeout opts)
where
-- Initialize the socket
zinit = do
liftIO $ print "waiting for messages"
sock <- ZMQ.socket ctx ZMQ.Rep
ZMQ.bind sock (_addr opts)
return sock

-- On timeout or completion guarantee the socket get closed.

zclose sock = do
liftIO $ print "finalizing"
ZMQ.close sock

runZmq :: ZMQ.Context -> Opts -> IO ()

runZmq ctx opts = runSafeT $ runEffect $
collect ctx opts >-> P.take 10 >-> P.print

main :: IO ()
main = do
ctx <- ZMQ.init 1
let opts = Opts {_addr = "tcp://127.0.0.1:8000", _timeout = 1000000 }
runZmq ctx opts
ZMQ.term ctx
333 STREAMING

Conduits

await :: Monad m => ConduitM i o m (Maybe i)

yield :: Monad m => o -> ConduitM i o m ()

runConduit :: Monad m => ConduitT () Void m r -> m r

(.|) :: Monad m
=> ConduitM a b m ()
-> ConduitM b c m r
-> ConduitM a c m r

Conduits are conceptually similar though philosophically different approach to the same problem of constant space
deterministic resource handling for IO resources.
The first initial difference is that await function now returns a Maybe which allows different handling of termination.

Since 1.2.8 the separate connecting and fusing operators are deprecated in favor of a single fusing operator (.|) .

{-# LANGUAGE MultiWayIf #-}

import Control.Monad.Trans
import Data.Conduit
import qualified Data.Conduit.List as CL

source :: ConduitT () Int IO ()

source = CL.sourceList [1 .. 100]

conduit :: ConduitT Int String IO ()

conduit = do
val <- await
case val of
Nothing -> return ()
Just n -> do
if | n `mod` 15 == 0 -> yield "FizzBuzz"
| n `mod` 5 == 0 -> yield "Fizz"
| n `mod` 3 == 0 -> yield "Buzz"
| otherwise -> return ()
conduit

sink :: ConduitT String o IO ()

sink = CL.mapM_ putStrLn

main :: IO ()
main = runConduit $ source .| conduit .| sink
STREAMING 334
Chapter 25

Cryptography

Recently Haskell has seen quite a bit of development of cryptography libraries as it serves as an excellent language for work­
ing with and manipulating algebraic structures found in cryptographic primitives. In addition to most of the basic hash­
ing, elliptic curve and cipher suites libraries, Haskell has a excellent standard cryptography library called cryptonite
which provides the standard kitchen sink of most modern primitives. These include hash functions, elliptic curve cryp­
tography, digital signature algorithms, ciphers, one time passwords, entropy generation and safe memory handling.

SHA Hashing
A cryptographic hash function is a special class of hash function that has certain properties which make it suitable for
use in cryptography. It is a mathematical algorithm that maps data of arbitrary size to a bit string of a fixed size (a hash
function) which is designed to also be a one­way function, that is, a function which is infeasible to invert.

SHA­256 is a cryptographic hash function from the SHA­2 family and is standardized by NIST. It produces a 256­bit
message digest.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Crypto.Hash (SHA256, Digest, hash)

import Data.ByteArray (convert)
import Data.ByteString.Char8 (ByteString)

v1 :: ByteString
v1 = "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog"

h1 :: Digest SHA256
h1 = hash v1

s1 :: ByteString
s1 = convert h1

main :: IO ()
main = do
print v1
print h1
print s1

335
CRYPTOGRAPHY 336

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Crypto.Hash (Keccak_256, Digest, hash)

import Data.ByteArray (convert)
import Data.ByteString.Char8 (ByteString)

v1 :: ByteString
v1 = "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog"

h1 :: Digest Keccak_256
h1 = hash v1

s1 :: ByteString
s1 = convert h1

main :: IO ()
main = do
print v1
print h1
print s1

Password Hashing
Modern applications should use one of either the Blake2 or Argon2 hashing algorithms for storing passwords in a database
as part of an authentication workflow.
To use Argon2:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Argon where

import Crypto.Error
import Crypto.KDF.Argon2
import Crypto.Random (getRandomBytes)
import Data.ByteString

passHash :: IO ()
passHash = do
salt <- getRandomBytes 16 :: IO ByteString
out <- throwCryptoErrorIO (hash defaultOptions ("hunter2" :: ByteString) salt 256)
print (out :: ByteString)

To use Blake2:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Blake2 where

import Crypto.Hash
337 CRYPTOGRAPHY

import Data.ByteString

passHash :: Digest Blake2b_256

passHash = hash ("hunter2" :: ByteString)

Curve25519 Diffie­Hellman
Curve25519 is a widely used Diffie­Hellman function suitable for a wide variety of applications. Private and public keys
using Curve25519 are 32 bytes each. Elliptic curve Diffie­Hellman is a protocol in which two parties can exchange their
public keys in the clear and generate a shared secret which can be used to share information across a secure channel.
A private key is a large integral value which is multiplied by the base point on the curve to generate the public key.
Going to backwards from a public key requires one to solve the elliptic curve discrete logarithm which is believed to be
computationally infeasible.

generateSecretKey :: MonadRandom m => m SecretKey

toPublic :: SecretKey -> PublicKey

Diffie­Hellman key exchange be performed by executing the function dh over the private and public keys for Alice and
Bob.

dh :: PublicKey -> SecretKey -> DhSecret

An example is shown below:

import Crypto.Error
import qualified Crypto.PubKey.Curve25519 as Curve25519

-- Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange for Curve25519

dh :: IO ()
dh = do
alicePriv <- Curve25519.generateSecretKey
bobPriv <- Curve25519.generateSecretKey
let secret1 = Curve25519.dh (Curve25519.toPublic alicePriv) bobPriv
let secret2 = Curve25519.dh (Curve25519.toPublic bobPriv) alicePriv
print (secret1 == secret2)

See:
• curve25519

Ed25519 EdDSA
EdDSA is a digital signature scheme based on Schnorr signature using the twisted Edwards curve Ed25519 and SHA­512
(SHA­2). It generates succinct (64 byte) signatures and has fast verification times.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Ed25519 where

CRYPTOGRAPHY 338

import Crypto.PubKey.Ed25519 as Ed25519

import Data.ByteString

msg :: ByteString
msg = "My example message"

example :: IO ()
example = do
privKey <- Ed25519.generateSecretKey
let pubKey = Ed25519.toPublic privKey
let sig = sign privKey pubKey msg
print sig
print (Ed25519.verify pubKey msg sig)

See Also:
• ed25519

Merkle Trees
Merkle trees are a type of authenticated data structure that consits of a sequence of data that is divided into an even
number of partitions which are incrementally hashed in a binary tree, with each level of the tree hashing to produce the
hash of the next level until the root of the tree is reached. The root hash is called the Merkle root and uniquely identifies
the data included under it. Any change to the leaves, or any reorordering of the nodes will produce a different hash.
A Merkle tree admits an efficient “proof of inclusion” where to produce evidence that a single node is included in the set
can be done by simply tracing the roots of a single node up to the binary tree to the root. This is a logarithmic order set
of hashes and is quite efficient.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Crypto.Hash
import Data.ByteArray (convert)
import qualified Data.ByteString as B

segmentSize :: Int
segmentSize = 64

type Hash = Digest SHA256

joinHash :: Hash -> Hash -> Hash

joinHash a b = hash (B.append (convert a) (convert b))

segments :: B.ByteString -> [B.ByteString]

segments bs
| B.null bs = []
| otherwise = seg : segments rest where
(seg, rest) = B.splitAt segmentSize bs

merkleRoot :: [Hash] -> Hash

merkleRoot [h] = h
merkleRoot hs = joinHash (merkleRoot left) (merkleRoot right)
339 CRYPTOGRAPHY

where
(left, right) = splitAt i hs
i = until (\x -> x*2 >= length hs) (*2) 1

tree :: Hash
tree = merkleRoot $ map hash (["4", "8", "15", "16", "23", "42"] :: [B.ByteString])

file :: IO ()
file = B.readFile "Merkle.hs" >>= print . merkleRoot . map hash . segments

Secure Memory Handling

When using Haskell for cryptography work and even inside web services, some care must be taken to ensure that the
primitives you are using don’t accidentally expose secrets or user data accidentally. This can occur in many ways through
the mishandling of keys, timing attacks against interactive protocols, and the insecure wiping of memory.
When using Haskell integers be aware that arithmetic operations are not constant time and are simply backed by GMP
integers. This may or may not be appropriate for your code if you expect arithmetic operations to be branch­free or have
constant time addition or multiplication. If you need constant arithmetic you will likely have to drop down to C or
Assembly and link the resulting code into your Haskell logic. Many Haskell cryptography libraries do just this.
With regards to timing attacks, take note of which functions are marked as vulnerable to timing attacks as most of these
are marked in public API documentation.
When comparing hashes and unencrypted data for equality also make sure to use an equality test which is constant
time. The default derived instance for Eq does not have this property. The securemem library provides a SecureMem
datatype which can hold an arbitrary sized ByteString and can only be compared against other SecureMem ByteStrings
by a constant time algorithm.

-- import Data.SecureMem
allocateSecureMem :: Int -> IO SecureMem
finalizeSecureMem :: SecureMem -> IO ()
toSecureMem :: ByteString -> SecureMem

This data structure will also automatically scrub its bytes with a runtime integrated finalizer on the pointer to the under­
lying memory. This ensures that as soon as the value is garbage collected, its underlying memory is wiped to zero values
and does not linger on the process’s memory.

AES Encryption
AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) is a symmetric block cipher standardized by NIST. The cipher block size is fixed
at 16 bytes and it is encrypted using a key of 128, 192 or 256 bits. AES is common cipher standard for symmetric
encryption and used heavily in internet protocols.
An example of encrypting and decrypting data using the cryptonite library is shown below:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module AES where

import Crypto.Cipher.AES
CRYPTOGRAPHY 340

import Crypto.Cipher.Types
import Crypto.Error
import Crypto.Random.Types
import Data.ByteString

type AesKey = ByteString

genKey :: IO AesKey
genKey = getRandomBytes 32 -- AES256 key size

aesEncrypt :: ByteString -> AesKey -> Either CryptoError ByteString

aesEncrypt input sk =
ctrCombine
<$> init
<*> pure nullIV
<*> pure input
where
init :: Either CryptoError AES256
init = eitherCryptoError $ cipherInit sk

aesDecrypt :: ByteString -> AesKey -> Either CryptoError ByteString

aesDecrypt = aesEncrypt

main :: IO ()
main = do
key <- genKey
let message = "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog."
mcipherText = aesEncrypt message key
case mcipherText of
Right cipherText -> do
print cipherText
print (aesDecrypt cipherText key)
Left err -> print err

Galois Fields
Many modern cryptographic protocols require the use of finite field arithmetic. Finite fields are algebraic structures that
have algebraic field structure (addition, multiplication, division) and closure

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedLists #-}

module Galois where

import Data.Field.Galois
import Prelude hiding ((/))

-- Prime field
341 CRYPTOGRAPHY

type Fq = Prime 2147483647

exampleFq :: IO ()
exampleFq = do
print ((1 + 0x7FFFFFFF16) :: Fq)
print ((10000 * 10000) :: Fq)
print ((1 / 524287) :: Fq)

-- Polynomial term
data P2

-- Extension field
type Fq2 = Extension P2 Fq

-- Irreducublie monic polynomial extension

instance IrreducibleMonic P2 Fq where
poly _ = X2 + 1

-- Polynomial 2*x^2 + 1 over Fq2

p1 :: Fq2
p1 = [1, 2]

p2 :: Fq2
p2 = (p1 + p1) * 2

p3 :: Bool
p3 = p2 / p1 == 4

See:
• galois­field

Elliptic Curves
Elliptic curves are a type of algebraic structure that are used heavily in cryptography. Most generally elliptic curves are
families of curves to second order plane curves in two variables defined over finite fields. These elliptic curves admit
a group construction over the curve points which has multiplication and addition. For finite fields with large order
computing inversions is quite computationally difficult and gives rise to a trapdoor function which is easy to compute
in one direction but difficult in reverse.
There are many types of plane curves with different coefficients that can be defined. The widely studied groups are one
of the four classes. These are defined in the elliptic-curve library as lifted datatypes which are used at the type­level
to distinguish curve operations.
• Binary
• Edwards
• Montgomery
• Weierstrass
On top of these curves there is an additional degree of freedom in the choice of coordinate system used. There are many
ways to interpret the Cartesian plane in terms of coordinates and some of these coordinate systems admit more efficient
operations for multiplication and addition of points.
• Affine
• Jacobian
CRYPTOGRAPHY 342

• Projective

For example the common Ed25519 curve can be defined as the following group structure defined as a series of type­level
constructions:

type Fr = Prime
7237005577332262213973186563042994240857116359379907606001950938285454250989
type Fq = Prime
57896044618658097711785492504343953926634992332820282019728792003956564819949
type PA = Point Edwards Affine Ed25519 Fq Fr
type PP = Point Edwards Projective Ed25519 Fq Fr

Operations on this can be executed by several type classes functions.

module Example where

import Data.Curve.Edwards.Ed25519 as Ed25519

import Protolude

-- generate random affine point

p1 :: Ed25519.PA
p1 = Ed25519.gen

-- generate affine point by multiply by field coefficient

p2 :: Ed25519.PA
p2 = Ed25519.mul p1 (3 :: Ed25519.Fr)

-- point addition
p3 :: Ed25519.PA
p3 = Ed25519.add p1 p2

-- point identity
p4 :: Ed25519.PA
p4 = Ed25519.id

-- point doubling
p5 :: Ed25519.PA
p5 = Ed25519.dbl p1

-- point inversion
p6 :: Ed25519.PA
p6 = Ed25519.inv p1

-- Frobenius endomorphism
p7 :: Ed25519.PA
p7 = Ed25519.frob p1

-- base point
p8 :: Ed25519.PA
p8 = Ed25519.gA

-- convert affine coordinates to projective coordinates

p9 :: Ed25519.PP
343 CRYPTOGRAPHY

p9 = Ed25519.fromA p8

-- get y coordinate (point from Fq) from coordinate

p10 :: Maybe Ed25519.Fq
p10 = Ed25519.yX p1 (2 :: Fq)

See: elliptic­curve

Pairing Cryptography
Cryptographic pairings are a novel technique that allows us to construct bilinear mappings of the form:

e : G1 × G2 → GT

These are bilinear over group addition and multiplication.

e(g1 + g2 , h) = e(g1 , h)e(g2 , h)

e(g, h1 + h2 ) = e(g, h1 )e(g, h2 )

There are many types of pairings that can be computed. The pairing library implements the Ate pairing over several
elliptic curve groups including the Barreto­Naehrig family and the BLS12­381 curve. These types of pairings are used
quite frequently in modern cryptographic protocols such as the construction of zkSNARKs.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedLists #-}

module Main where

import Data.Curve.Weierstrass (Point (A), mul')

import Data.Group (pow)
import Data.Pairing.BN254 (BN254, G1, G2, pairing)

p :: G1 BN254
p =
A
1368015179489954701390400359078579693043519447331113978918064868415326638035
9918110051302171585080402603319702774565515993150576347155970296011118125764

q :: G2 BN254
q =
A
[ 2725019753478801796453339367788033689375851816420509565303521482350756874229,
7273165102799931111715871471550377909735733521218303035754523677688038059653
]
[ 2512659008974376214222774206987427162027254181373325676825515531566330959255,
957874124722006818841961785324909313781880061366718538693995380805373202866
]

main :: IO ()
CRYPTOGRAPHY 344

main = do
putStrLn "e(P, Q):"
print (pairing p q)
putStrLn "e(P, Q) is bilinear:"
print $ pairing (mul' p a) (mul' q b) == pow (pairing p q) (a * b)
where
a = 2 :: Int
b = 3 :: Int

See
• Pairing
• Optimal Ate Pairing

zkSNARKs
zkSNARKS (zero knowledge succinct non­interactive arguments of knowledge) are a modern cryptographic construction
that enable two parties called the Prover and Verifier to convince the verifier that a general computational statement is
true without revealing anything else.
Haskell has a variety of libraries for building zkSNARK protocols including libraries to build circuit representations of
embedded domain specific languages and produce succinct pairing based zero knowledge proofs.
• zkp ­ Implementation of the Groth16 protocol based on bilinear pairings.
• bulletproofs ­ Implementation of the Bulletproofs protocol.
• arithmetic­circuits Generic data structures for construction arithmetic circuits and Rank­1 constraint systems
(R1CS) in Haskell.
Chapter 26

Dates and Times

time
Haskell’s datetime library is unambiguously called time it exposes six core data structure which hold temporal quantities
of various precisions.
• Day ­ Datetime triple of day, month, year in the Gregorian calendar system
• TimeOfDay ­ A clock time measure in hours, minutes and seconds
• UTCTime ­ A unix time measured in seconds since the Unix epoch.
• TimeZone ­ A ISO8601 timezone
• LocalTime ­ A Day and TimeOfDay combined into a aggregate type.
• ZonedTime ­ A LocalTime combined with TimeZone.
There are several delta types that correspond to changes in time measured in various units of days or seconds.
• NominalDiffTime ­ Time delta measured in picoseconds.
• CalendarDiffDays ­ Calendar delta measured in months and days offset.
• CalendarDiffTime ­ Time difference measured in months and picoseconds.

module Time where

import Data.Maybe
import Data.Time

-- Example date:
-- April 5, 2063
day :: Day
day = fromJust $ fromGregorianValid year month day
where
year = 2063
month = 4
day = 5

-- Adding day deltas to dates

delta :: Day
delta = 3 `addDays` day

-- Adding month deltas to dates

deltaMo :: Day

345
DATES AND TIMES 346

deltaMo = 8 `addGregorianMonthsClip` day

-- Number of days between two dates

diff :: Integer
diff = delta `diffDays` day

-- Example time
time :: IO UTCTime
time = getCurrentTime

-- Add NominalDiffTime (i.e. picoseconds) to the time

-- Add 5 minutes.
-- Num instance converts from integral seconds to picoseconds
tdelta :: IO UTCTime
tdelta = do
time <- getCurrentTime
pure (300 `addUTCTime` time)

-- Get the current time zone

zone :: IO TimeZone
zone = getCurrentTimeZone

-- Get current time with timezone attached

zonetime :: IO ZonedTime
zonetime = getZonedTime

timer :: IO NominalDiffTime
timer = do
start <- getCurrentTime
end <- getCurrentTime
pure (diffUTCTime end start)

ISO8601
The ISO standard for rendering and parsing datetimes can work with the default temporal datatypes. These work bidi­
rectionally for both parsing and pretty printing. Simple use case is shown below:

module Time where

import Data.Maybe
import Data.Time
import Data.Time.Format.ISO8601

-- April 5, 2063
day :: Day
day = fromJust (fromGregorianValid year month day)
where
year = 2063
month = 4
day = 5
347 DATES AND TIMES

printing :: IO ()
printing = do
t <- getCurrentTime
zt <- getZonedTime
print (iso8601Show day)
print (iso8601Show t)
print (iso8601Show zt)

parsing :: IO ()
parsing = do
d <- iso8601ParseM "2063-04-05" :: IO Day
t <- iso8601ParseM "2020-01-29T15:03:43.013033515Z" :: IO UTCTime
zt <- iso8601ParseM "2020-01-29T15:03:43.013040029+00:00" :: IO ZonedTime
print d
print t
print zt
DATES AND TIMES 348
Chapter 27

Data Formats

JSON
Aeson is a library for efficient parsing and generating JSON. It is the canonical JSON library for handling JSON.

decode :: FromJSON a => ByteString -> Maybe a

encode :: ToJSON a => a -> ByteString
eitherDecode :: FromJSON a => ByteString -> Either String a

fromJSON :: FromJSON a => Value -> Result a

toJSON :: ToJSON a => a -> Value

A point of some subtlety to beginners is that the return types for Aeson functions are polymorphic in their return types
meaning that the resulting type of decode is specified only in the context of your programs use of the decode function. So
if you use decode in a point your program and bind it to a value x and then use x as if it were an integer throughout the
rest of your program, Aeson will select the typeclass instance which parses the given input string into a Haskell integer.
• Aeson Library

Value
Aeson uses several high performance data structures (Vector, Text, HashMap) by default instead of the naive versions so
typically using Aeson will require that we import them and use OverloadedStrings when indexing into objects.

The underlying Aeson structure is called Value and encodes a recursive tree structure that models the semantics of
untyped JSON objects by mapping them onto a large sum type which embodies all possible JSON values.

type Object = HashMap Text Value

type Array = Vector Value

-- | A JSON value represented as a Haskell value.

data Value
= Object !Object
| Array !Array
| String !Text
| Number !Scientific

349
DATA FORMATS 350

| Bool !Bool
| Null

For instance the Value expansion of the following JSON blob:

{
"a": [1,2,3],
"b": 1
}

Is represented in Aeson as the Value :

Object
(fromList
[ ( "a"
, Array (fromList [ Number 1.0 , Number 2.0 , Number 3.0 ])
)
, ( "b" , Number 1.0 )
])

Let’s consider some larger examples, we’ll work with this contrived example JSON:

{
"id": 1,
"name": "A green door",
"price": 12.50,
"tags": ["home", "green"],
"refs": {
"a": "red",
"b": "blue"
}
}

Unstructured or Dynamic JSON

In dynamic scripting languages it’s common to parse amorphous blobs of JSON without any a priori structure and then
handle validation problems by throwing exceptions while traversing it. We can do the same using Aeson and the Maybe
monad.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Data.Text
import Data.Aeson
import Data.Vector
import qualified Data.HashMap.Strict as M
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL

-- Pull a key out of an JSON object.

(^?) :: Value -> Text -> Maybe Value
(^?) (Object obj) k = M.lookup k obj
351 DATA FORMATS

(^?) _ _ = Nothing

-- Pull the ith value out of a JSON list.

ix :: Value -> Int -> Maybe Value
ix (Array arr) i = arr !? i
ix _ _ = Nothing

readJSON str = do
obj <- decode str
price <- obj ^? "price"
refs <- obj ^? "refs"
tags <- obj ^? "tags"
aref <- refs ^? "a"
tag1 <- tags `ix` 0
return (price, aref, tag1)

main :: IO ()
main = do
contents <- BL.readFile "example.json"
print $ readJSON contents

Structured JSON
This isn’t ideal since we’ve just smeared all the validation logic across our traversal logic instead of separating concerns
and handling validation in separate logic. We’d like to describe the structure before­hand and the invalid case separately.
Using Generic also allows Haskell to automatically write the serializer and deserializer between our datatype and the
JSON string based on the names of record field names.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

import Data.Text
import Data.Aeson
import GHC.Generics
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL

import Control.Applicative

data Refs = Refs

{ a :: Text
, b :: Text
} deriving (Show,Generic)

data Data = Data

{ id :: Int
, name :: Text
, price :: Float
, tags :: [Text]
, refs :: Refs
} deriving (Show,Generic)

instance FromJSON Data

instance FromJSON Refs
DATA FORMATS 352

instance ToJSON Data

instance ToJSON Refs

main :: IO ()
main = do
contents <- BL.readFile "example.json"
let Just dat = decode contents
print $ name dat
print $ a (refs dat)

Now we get our validated JSON wrapped up into a nicely typed Haskell ADT.

Data
{ id = 1
, name = "A green door"
, price = 12
, tags = [ "home" , "green" ]
, refs = Refs { a = "red" , b = "blue" }
}

The functions fromJSON and toJSON can be used to convert between this sum type and regular Haskell types with.

data Result a = Error String | Success a

λ: fromJSON (Bool True) :: Result Bool

Success True

λ: fromJSON (Bool True) :: Result Double

Error "when expecting a Double, encountered Boolean instead"

As of 7.10.2 we can use the new ­XDeriveAnyClass to automatically derive instances of FromJSON and TOJSON
without the need for standalone instance declarations. These are implemented entirely in terms of the default methods
which use Generics under the hood.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveAnyClass #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

import Data.Aeson
import Data.ByteString.Lazy.Char8 as BL
import Data.Text
import GHC.Generics

data Refs
= Refs
{ a :: Text,
b :: Text
}
deriving (Show, Generic, FromJSON, ToJSON)

data Data
353 DATA FORMATS

= Data
{ id :: Int,
name :: Text,
price :: Int,
tags :: [Text],
refs :: Refs
}
deriving (Show, Generic, FromJSON, ToJSON)

main :: IO ()
main = do
contents <- BL.readFile "example.json"
let Just dat = decode contents
print $ name dat
print $ a (refs dat)
BL.putStrLn $ encode dat

Hand Written Instances

While it’s useful to use generics to derive instances, sometimes you actually want more fine grained control over serializa­
tion and de serialization. So we fall back on writing ToJSON and FromJSON instances manually. Using FromJSON we
can project into hashmap using the (.:) operator to extract keys. If the key fails to exist the parser will abort with a key
failure message. The ToJSON instances can never fail and simply require us to pattern match on our custom datatype
and generate an appropriate value.
The law that the FromJSON and ToJSON classes should maintain is that encode . decode and decode . encode
should map to the same object. Although in practice there many times when we break this rule and especially if the
serialize or de serialize is one way.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

import Data.Text
import Data.Aeson
import Data.Maybe
import Data.Aeson.Types
import Control.Applicative
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL

data Crew = Crew

{ name :: Text
, rank :: Rank
} deriving (Show)

data Rank
= Captain
| Ensign
| Lieutenant
deriving (Show)

-- Custom JSON Deserializer

DATA FORMATS 354

instance FromJSON Crew where

parseJSON (Object o) = do
_name <- o .: "name"
_rank <- o .: "rank"
pure (Crew _name _rank)

instance FromJSON Rank where

parseJSON (String s) = case s of
"Captain" -> pure Captain
"Ensign" -> pure Ensign
"Lieutenant" -> pure Lieutenant
_ -> typeMismatch "Could not parse Rank" (String s)
parseJSON x = typeMismatch "Expected String" x

-- Custom JSON Serializer

instance ToJSON Crew where

toJSON (Crew name rank) = object [
"name" .= name
, "rank" .= rank
]

instance ToJSON Rank where

toJSON Captain = String "Captain"
toJSON Ensign = String "Ensign"
toJSON Lieutenant = String "Lieutenant"

roundTrips :: Crew -> Bool

roundTrips = isJust . go
where
go :: Crew -> Maybe Crew
go = decode . encode

picard :: Crew
picard = Crew { name = "Jean-Luc Picard", rank = Captain }

main :: IO ()
main = do
contents <- BL.readFile "crew.json"
let (res :: Maybe Crew) = decode contents
print res
print $ roundTrips picard

See: Aeson Documentation

Yaml
Yaml is a textual serialization format similar to JSON. It uses an indentation sensitive structure to encode nested maps
of keys and values. The Yaml interface for Haskell is a precise copy of Data.Aeson
• Yaml Library
355 DATA FORMATS

YAML Input:

invoice: 34843
date : 2001-01-23
bill:
given : Chris
family : Dumars
address:
lines: |
458 Walkman Dr.
Suite #292
city : Royal Oak
state : MI
postal : 48046

YAML Output:

Object
(fromList
[ ( "invoice" , Number 34843.0 )
, ( "date" , String "2001-01-23" )
, ( "bill-to"
, Object
(fromList
[ ( "address"
, Object
(fromList
[ ( "state" , String "MI" )
, ( "lines" , String "458 Walkman Dr.\nSuite #292\n" )
, ( "city" , String "Royal Oak" )
, ( "postal" , Number 48046.0 )
])
)
, ( "family" , String "Dumars" )
, ( "given" , String "Chris" )
])
)
])

To parse this file we use the following datatypes and functions:

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveAnyClass #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

import qualified Data.ByteString as BL

import Data.Text (Text)
import Data.Yaml
import GHC.Generics

data Invoice
= Invoice
DATA FORMATS 356

{ invoice :: Int,
date :: Text,
bill :: Billing
}
deriving (Show, Generic, FromJSON)

data Billing
= Billing
{ address :: Address,
family :: Text,
given :: Text
}
deriving (Show, Generic, FromJSON)

data Address
= Address
{ lines :: Text,
city :: Text,
state :: Text,
postal :: Int
}
deriving (Show, Generic, FromJSON)

main :: IO ()
main = do
contents <- BL.readFile "example.yaml"
let (res :: Either ParseException Invoice) = decodeEither' contents
case res of
Left err -> print err
Right val -> print val

Which generates:

Invoice
{ invoice = 34843
, date = "2001-01-23"
, bill =
Billing
{ address =
Address
{ lines = "458 Walkman Dr.\nSuite #292\n"
, city = "Royal Oak"
, state = "MI"
, postal = 48046
}
, family = "Dumars"
, given = "Chris"
}
}
357 DATA FORMATS

CSV
Cassava is an efficient CSV parser library. We’ll work with this tiny snippet from the iris dataset:
• Cassava Library

sepal_length,sepal_width,petal_length,petal_width,plant_class
5.1,3.5,1.4,0.2,Iris-setosa
5.0,2.0,3.5,1.0,Iris-versicolor
6.3,3.3,6.0,2.5,Iris-virginica

Unstructured CSV
Just like with Aeson if we really want to work with unstructured data the library accommodates this.

import Data.Csv

import Text.Show.Pretty

import qualified Data.Vector as V

import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL

type ErrorMsg = String

type CsvData = V.Vector (V.Vector BL.ByteString)

example :: FilePath -> IO (Either ErrorMsg CsvData)

example fname = do
contents <- BL.readFile fname
return $ decode NoHeader contents

We see we get the nested set of stringy vectors:

[ [ "sepal_length"
, "sepal_width"
, "petal_length"
, "petal_width"
, "plant_class"
]
, [ "5.1" , "3.5" , "1.4" , "0.2" , "Iris-setosa" ]
, [ "5.0" , "2.0" , "3.5" , "1.0" , "Iris-versicolor" ]
, [ "6.3" , "3.3" , "6.0" , "2.5" , "Iris-virginica" ]
]

Structured CSV
Just like with Aeson we can use Generic to automatically write the deserializer between our CSV data and our custom
datatype.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}
DATA FORMATS 358

import Data.Csv
import GHC.Generics
import qualified Data.Vector as V
import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as BL

data Plant = Plant

{ sepal_length :: Double
, sepal_width :: Double
, petal_length :: Double
, petal_width :: Double
, plant_class :: String
} deriving (Generic, Show)

instance FromNamedRecord Plant

instance ToNamedRecord Plant

type ErrorMsg = String

type CsvData = (Header, V.Vector Plant)

parseCSV :: FilePath -> IO (Either ErrorMsg CsvData)

parseCSV fname = do
contents <- BL.readFile fname
return $ decodeByName contents

main = parseCSV "iris.csv" >>= print

And again we get a nice typed ADT as a result.

[ Plant
{ sepal_length = 5.1
, sepal_width = 3.5
, petal_length = 1.4
, petal_width = 0.2
, plant_class = "Iris-setosa"
}
, Plant
{ sepal_length = 5.0
, sepal_width = 2.0
, petal_length = 3.5
, petal_width = 1.0
, plant_class = "Iris-versicolor"
}
, Plant
{ sepal_length = 6.3
, sepal_width = 3.3
, petal_length = 6.0
, petal_width = 2.5
, plant_class = "Iris-virginica"
}
]
Chapter 28

Network & Web Programming

There is a common meme that it is impossible to build web CRUD applications in Haskell. This absolutely false and
the ecosystem provides a wide variety of tools and frameworks for building modern web services. That said, although
Haskell has web frameworks the userbase of these libraries is several orders of magnitude less than common tools like
PHP and Wordpress and as such are not close to the level of polish, documentation, or userbase. Put simply you won’t
be able to drunkenly muddle your way through building a Haskell web application by copying and pasting code from
Stackoverflow.
Building web applications in Haskell is always a balance between the power and flexibility of the type­driven way of
building software versus the network effects of ecosystems based on dynamically typed languages with lower barriers to
entry.
Web packages can mostly be broken down into several categories:
• Web servers ­ Services that handle the TCP level of content delivery and protocol servicing.
• Request libraries ­ Libraries for issuing HTTP requests to other servers.
• Templating Libraries ­ Libraries to generate HTML from interpolating strings.
• HTML Generation ­ Libraries to generate HTML from Haskell datatypes.
• Form Handling & Validation ­ Libraries for handling form input and serialisation and validating data against a
given schema and constraint sets.
• Web Frameworks ­ Frameworks for constructing RESTful services and handling the lifecycle of HTTP requests
within a business logic framework.
• Database Mapping ­ ORM and database libraries to work with database models and serialise data to web services.
See Databases.

Frameworks
There are three large Haskell web frameworks:
Servant
Servant is the newest of the standard Haskell web frameworks. It emerged after GHC 8.0 and incorporates many modern
language extensions. It is based around the key idea of having a type­safe routing system in which many aspects of the
request/response cycle of the server are expressed at the type­level. This allows many common errors found in web
applications to be prevented. Servant also has very advanced documentation generation capability and can automatically
generate API endpoint documentation from the type signatures of an application. Servant has a reputation for being a
bit more challenging to learn but is quite powerful and has an wide user­base in the industrial Haskell community.
See: Servant
Scotty

359
NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 360

Scotty is a minimal web framework that builds on top of the Warp web server. It is based on a simple routing model and
that makes standing up simple REST API services quite simple. Its design is modeled after the Flask and Sinatra models
found in Python and Ruby.

See: Scotty

Yesod

Yesod is a large featureful ecosystem built on lots of metaprogramming using Template Haskell. There is excellent
documentation and a book on building real world applications. This style of metaprogramming appeals to some types
of programmers who can work with the code generation style.

Snap

Snap is a small Haskell web framework which was developed heavily in the early 2000s. It is based on a very well­tested
core and has a modular framework in which “snaplets” can extend the base server. Much of the Haskell.org infrastructure
of packages and development runs on top of Snap web applications.

HTTP Requests
Haskell has a variety of HTTP request and processing libraries. The simplest and most flexible is the HTTP library.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Control.Applicative
import Control.Concurrent.Async
import Network.HTTP.Client
import Network.HTTP.Types

type URL = String

get :: Manager -> URL -> IO Int

get m url = do
req <- parseUrlThrow url
statusCode . responseStatus <$> httpNoBody req m

single :: IO Int
single = do
manager <- newManager defaultManagerSettings
get manager "http://haskell.org"

parallel :: IO [Int]
parallel = do
manager <- newManager defaultManagerSettings
-- Fetch w3.org 10 times concurrently
let urls = replicate 10 "http://www.w3.org"
mapConcurrently (get manager) urls

main :: IO ()
main = do
print =<< single
print =<< parallel
361 NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING

Req

Req is a modern HTTP request library that provides a simple monad for executing batches of HTTP requests to servers.
It integrates closely with the Aeson library for JSON handling and exposes a type safe API to prevent the mixing of
invalid requests and payload types.

The two toplevel functions of note are req and runReq which run inside of a Req monad which holds the socket
state.

runReq :: MonadIO m => HttpConfig -> Req a -> m a

req
:: ( MonadHttp m
, HttpMethod method
, HttpBody body
, HttpResponse response
, HttpBodyAllowed (AllowsBody method) (ProvidesBody body) )
=> method -- ^ HTTP method
-> Url scheme -- ^ 'Url'—location of resource
-> body -- ^ Body of the request
-> Proxy response -- ^ A hint how to interpret response
-> Option scheme -- ^ Collection of optional parameters
-> m response -- ^ Response

A end to end example can include serialising and de serialising requests to and from JSON from RESTful services.

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveAnyClass #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Control.Monad.Trans
import Data.Aeson
import GHC.Generics
import Network.HTTP.Req

data Point = Point {x :: Int, y :: Int}

deriving (Generic, ToJSON, FromJSON)

example :: IO ()
example = runReq defaultHttpConfig $ do
-- GET request http response
r <- req GET (https "w3.org") NoReqBody bsResponse mempty
liftIO $ print (responseBody r)
-- GET request json response
r <- req GET (https "api.github.com" /: "users" /: "sdiehl") NoReqBody jsonResponse mempty
liftIO $ print (responseBody r :: Value)
-- POST request json payload
r <- req POST (https "example.com") (ReqBodyJson (Point 1 2)) jsonResponse mempty
liftIO $ print (responseBody r :: Value)
NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 362

Blaze
Blaze is an HTML combinator library that provides that capacity to build composable bits of HTML programmatically.
It doesn’t string templating libraries like Hastache but instead provides an API for building up HTML documents from
logic where the format out of the output is generated procedurally.

For sequencing HTML elements the elements can either be sequenced in a monad or with monoid operations.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Html where

import Text.Blaze.Html5
import Text.Blaze.Html.Renderer.Text

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as T

example :: Html
example = do
h1 "First header"
p $ ul $ mconcat [li "First", li "Second"]

main :: IO ()
main = do
T.putStrLn $ renderHtml example

For custom datatypes we can implement the ToMarkup class to convert between Haskell data structures and HTML
representation.

{-# LANGUAGE RecordWildCards #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Html where

import Text.Blaze.Html5
import Text.Blaze.Html.Renderer.Text

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy as T

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as T

data Employee = Employee

{ name :: T.Text
, age :: Int
}

instance ToMarkup Employee where

toMarkup Employee {..} = ul $ mconcat
[ li (toHtml name)
, li (toHtml age)
]

fred :: Employee
fred = Employee { name = "Fred", age = 35 }
363 NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING

main :: IO ()
main = do
T.putStrLn $ renderHtml (toHtml fred)

Lucid
Lucid is another HTML generation library. It takes a different namespacing approach than Blaze and doesn’t use names
which clash with the default Prelude exports. So elements like div , id , and head are replaced with underscore
suffixed functions. div_ , id_ and head_ .

The base interface is defined through a ToHTML typeclass which renders an element into a text builder interface wrapped
in HtmlT transformer.

class ToHtml a where

toHtml :: Monad m => a -> HtmlT m ()
toHtmlRaw :: Monad m => a -> HtmlT m ()

execHtmlT :: Monad m => HtmlT m a -> m Builder

renderText :: Html a -> Text
renderBS :: Html a -> ByteString

New elements and attributes can be created by the smart constructors for Attribute and Element types.

makeAttribute
:: Text -- ^ Attribute name.
-> Text -- ^ Attribute value.
-> Attribute

makeElement
:: Functor m
=> Text -- ^ Name.
-> HtmlT m a -- ^ Children HTML.
-> HtmlT m a -- ^ A parent element.

A simple example of usage is shown below:

{-# LANGUAGE BlockArguments #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

module Main where

import Lucid
import Lucid.Base
import Lucid.Html5

example1 :: Html ()
example1 = table_ (tr_ (td_ (p_ "My table.")))

example2 :: Html ()
NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 364

example2 = html_ do
head_ do
title_ "HTML from Haskell"
link_ [rel_ "stylesheet", type_ "text/css", href_ "bootstrap.css"]
body_ do
p_ "Generating HTMl form Haskell datatypes:"
ul_ $ mapM_ (li_ . toHtml . show) [1 .. 100]

main :: IO ()
main = do
print (renderText example1)
print (renderBS example2)

Hastache
Hastache is string templating based on the “Mustache” style of encoding metavariables with double braces {{ x }} .
Hastache supports automatically converting many Haskell types into strings and uses the efficient Text functions for
formatting.
The variables loaded into the template are specified in either a function mapping variable names to printable MuType
values. For instance using a function.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Text.Hastache
import Text.Hastache.Context

import qualified Data.Text as T

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy as TL
import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as TL

import Data.Data

template :: FilePath -> MuContext IO -> IO TL.Text

template = hastacheFile defaultConfig

-- Function strContext
context :: String -> MuType IO
context "body" = MuVariable ("Hello World" :: TL.Text)
context "title" = MuVariable ("Haskell is lovely" :: TL.Text)
context _ = MuVariable ()

main :: IO ()
main = do
output <- template "templates/home.html" (mkStrContext context)
TL.putStrLn output

Or using Data­Typeable record and mkGenericContext , the Haskell field names are converted into variable names.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}
365 NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING

import Text.Hastache
import Text.Hastache.Context

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy as TL

import qualified Data.Text.Lazy.IO as TL

import Data.Data

template :: FilePath -> MuContext IO -> IO TL.Text

template = hastacheFile defaultConfig

-- Record context
data TemplateCtx = TemplateCtx
{ body :: TL.Text
, title :: TL.Text
} deriving (Data, Typeable)

main :: IO ()
main = do
let ctx = TemplateCtx { body = "Hello", title = "Haskell" }
output <- template "templates/home.html" (mkGenericContext ctx)
TL.putStrLn output

The MuType and MuContext types can be parameterized by any monad or transformer that implements MonadIO , not
just IO.

Warp
Warp is a efficient massively concurrent web server, it is the backend server behind several of popular Haskell web
frameworks. The internals have been finely tuned to utilize Haskell’s concurrent runtime and is capable of handling a
great deal of concurrent requests. For example we can construct a simple web service which simply returns a 200 status
code with a ByteString which is flushed to the socket.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Network.HTTP.Types
import Network.Wai
import Network.Wai.Handler.Warp (run)

app :: Application
app req respond = respond $ responseLBS status200 [] "Make it so."

main :: IO ()
main = run 8000 app

See: Warp
NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 366

Scotty
Continuing with our trek through web libraries, Scotty is a web microframework similar in principle to Flask in Python
or Sinatra in Ruby.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Web.Scotty

import qualified Text.Blaze.Html5 as H

import Text.Blaze.Html5 (toHtml, Html)
import Text.Blaze.Html.Renderer.Text (renderHtml)

greet :: String -> Html

greet user = H.html $ do
H.head $
H.title "Welcome!"
H.body $ do
H.h1 "Greetings!"
H.p ("Hello " >> toHtml user >> "!")

app = do
get "/" $
text "Home Page"

get "/greet/:name" $ do
name <- param "name"
html $ renderHtml (greet name)

main :: IO ()
main = scotty 8000 app

Of importance to note is the Blaze library used here overloads do­notation but is not itself a proper monad so the various
laws and invariants that normally apply for monads may break down or fail with error terms.
A collection of useful related resources can be found on the Scotty wiki: Scotty Tutorials & Examples

Servant
Servant is a modern Haskell web framework heavily based on type­level programming patterns. Servant’s novel invention
is a type­safe way of specifying URL routes. This consists of two type­level infix combinators :> and :<|> combinators
which combine URL fragments into routes that are run by the web server. The two datatypes are defined as followings:

data (path :: k) :> (a :: *)

data a :<|> b

For example the URL endpoint for a GET route that returns JSON.

Endpoint Servant route

GET /api/hello "api" :> "hello" :> Get ‘[JSON] String
367 NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING

The HTTP methods are lifted to the type level as DataKinds from the following definition.

data StdMethod = GET | POST | HEAD | PUT | DELETE | TRACE | CONNECT | OPTIONS | PATCH

And the common type synonyms are given for successful requests:

type Post = Verb POST 200

type Get = Verb GET 200

For requests that receive a payload from the client a ReqBody is attached to the route which contains the content type
of the requested payload. This takes a type­level list of options and the Haskell value type to serialize into.

data ReqBody' (mods :: [*]) (contentTypes :: [*]) (a :: *)

Endpoint Servant route

POST /api/hello "api" :> "hello" :> ReqBody '[JSON] MyData :> Post '[JSON] MyData

The application itself is expressed simply as a function which takes a Request containing the headers and payload and
handles it by evaluating to a Response inside of the IO. The underlying server used in servant-server is Warp.

type Application
= Request
-> (Response -> IO ResponseReceived)
-> IO ResponseReceived

Middleware is then simply a higher order function which takes an Application to another Application .

type Middleware = Application -> Application

Handlers are specified defined in servant-server and are IO computations with failures handed by ServerError .
The toplevel functions run and serve can be used to instantiate the application inside of a server.

newtype Handler a = Handler { runHandler' :: ExceptT ServerError IO a }

serve :: HasServer api '[] => Proxy api -> Server api -> Application
run :: Port -> Application -> IO ()

For error handling the throwError function can be used attached to an error response code.

fail404 :: Handler ()
fail404 = throwError $ err404 { errBody = "Not found" }

Minimal Example
The simplest end to end example is simply a router which has a single endpoint mapping to a server handler which
returns the String “Hello World” as a application/json content type.

type AppAPI = "api" :> "hello" :> Get ‘[JSON] String

NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 368

appAPI :: Proxy AppAPI

appAPI = Proxy :: Proxy AppAPI

helloHandler :: Handler String

helloHandler = return "Hello World!"

apiHandler :: Server AppAPI

apiHandler = helloHandler

runServer :: IO ()
runServer = do
let port = 8000
run port (serve appAPI apiHandler)

Full Example
As a second case, we consider a larger application which builds a user interface which will enable the interface to send
and receive data from the client to the REST API.
First we define a custom User datatype and using generic deriving we can derive the serializer from URI form data
automatically.

data User = User {name :: Text, userId :: Int}

deriving stock (Generic, Show)
deriving anyclass (FromForm, FromHttpApiData)

The URL routes are specified in an API type which maps the REST verbs to response handlers.

type API =
Get '[HTML] Markup
:<|> ( "user" :> ReqBody '[FormUrlEncoded] User :> Post '[HTML] Markup )

The handler is an inhabitant of the API type and defines the value level handlers corresponding to the routes at the
type­level :<|> terms.

server :: Handler Markup :<|> (User -> Handler Markup)

server = index :<|> createUser

The page rendering itself is mostly blaze boilerplate that generates the markup programmatically using combinators. One
could just as easily plug in any of the templating languages (Mustache, …) instead here.

index :: Handler Markup

index = do
pure (page userForm)

userForm :: Html.Html
userForm =
Html.div ! Attr.class_ "row" $ do
form "/user" "post" $ do
field "name"
field "userId"
369 NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING

submit "Create user"

The page will include the html and header containing the source files. In this case we’ll simply load the Bootstrap library
from a CDN.

page :: Markup -> Markup

page body = do
Html.html do
Html.head do
Html.title "Example App"
Html.link
! Attr.rel "stylesheet"
! Attr.href "https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.7/css/bootstrap.min.css"
Html.body do
... other body markup ...

And then the handler for POST for the single endpoint will simply deserialize the User datatype form the POST data
and render it into a page with the fields extracted.

createUser :: User -> Handler Markup

createUser user@User {..} = do
liftIO (print user)
pure $ page $ do
Html.p ("Id: " <> toHtml userId)
Html.p ("Username: " <> toHtml name)

Putting it all together we can invoke run on a given port and serve the application. Point your browser at
localhost:8000 to see it run.

main :: IO ()
main = do
putStrLn "Running Server"
let application = Server.serve @API Proxy server
Warp.run 8000 application

From here you could all manner of additional logic, like adding in the Selda object relational mapper, adding in
servant-auth for authentication or using swagger2 for building Open API specifications.
NETWORK & WEB PROGRAMMING 370
Chapter 29

Databases

Haskell has bindings for most major databases and persistence engines. Generally the libraries will consist of two different
layers. The raw bindings which wrap the C library or wire protocol will usually be called -simple . So for example
postgresql-simple is the Haskell library for interfacing with the C library libpq-dev . Higher level libraries will
depend on this library for the bindings and provide higher level interfaces for building queries, managing transactions,
and connection pooling.

Postgres
Postgres is an object­relational database management system with a rich extension of the SQL standard. Consider the
following tables specified in DDL.

CREATE TABLE "books" (

"id" integer NOT NULL,
"title" text NOT NULL,
"author_id" integer,
"subject_id" integer,
Constraint "books_id_pkey" Primary Key ("id")
);

CREATE TABLE "authors" (

"id" integer NOT NULL,
"last_name" text,
"first_name" text,
Constraint "authors_pkey" Primary Key ("id")
);

The postgresql­simple bindings provide a thin wrapper to various libpq commands to interact with a Postgres server.
These functions all take a Connection object to the database instance and allow various bytestring queries to be sent
and result sets mapped into Haskell datatypes. There are four primary functions for these interactions:

query_ :: FromRow r => Connection -> Query -> IO [r]

query :: (ToRow q, FromRow r) => Connection -> Query -> q -> IO [r]
execute :: ToRow q => Connection -> Query -> q -> IO Int64
execute_ :: Connection -> Query -> IO Int64

The result of the query function is a list of elements which implement the FromRow typeclass. This can be many things

371
DATABASES 372

including a single element (Only), a list of tuples where each element implements FromField or a custom datatype
that itself implements FromRow . Under the hood the database bindings inspects the Postgres oid objects and then
attempts to convert them into the Haskell datatype of the field being scrutinised. This can fail at runtime if the types in
the database don’t align with the expected types in the logic executing the SQL query.

Tuples
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

import qualified Data.Text as T

import qualified Database.PostgreSQL.Simple as SQL

creds :: SQL.ConnectInfo
creds =
SQL.defaultConnectInfo
{ SQL.connectUser = "example",
SQL.connectPassword = "example",
SQL.connectDatabase = "booktown"
}

selectBooks :: SQL.Connection -> IO [(Int, T.Text, Int)]

selectBooks conn = SQL.query_ conn "select id, title, author_id from books"

main :: IO ()
main = do
conn <- SQL.connect creds
books <- selectBooks conn
print books

This yields the result set:

[ ( 7808 , "The Shining" , 4156 )

, ( 4513 , "Dune" , 1866 )
, ( 4267 , "2001: A Space Odyssey" , 2001 )
, ( 1608 , "The Cat in the Hat" , 1809 )
, ( 1590 , "Bartholomew and the Oobleck" , 1809 )
, ( 25908 , "Franklin in the Dark" , 15990 )
, ( 1501 , "Goodnight Moon" , 2031 )
, ( 190 , "Little Women" , 16 )
, ( 1234 , "The Velveteen Rabbit" , 25041 )
, ( 2038 , "Dynamic Anatomy" , 1644 )
, ( 156 , "The Tell-Tale Heart" , 115 )
, ( 41473 , "Programming Python" , 7805 )
, ( 41477 , "Learning Python" , 7805 )
, ( 41478 , "Perl Cookbook" , 7806 )
, ( 41472 , "Practical PostgreSQL" , 1212 )
]
373 DATABASES

Custom Types

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import qualified Data.Text as T

import qualified Database.PostgreSQL.Simple as SQL

import Database.PostgreSQL.Simple.FromRow (FromRow(..), field)

data Book = Book

{ id_ :: Int
, title :: T.Text
, author_id :: Int
} deriving (Show)

instance FromRow Book where

fromRow = Book <$> field <*> field <*> field

creds :: SQL.ConnectInfo
creds = SQL.defaultConnectInfo
{ SQL.connectUser = "example"
, SQL.connectPassword = "example"
, SQL.connectDatabase = "booktown"
}

selectBooks :: SQL.Connection -> IO [Book]

selectBooks conn = SQL.query_ conn "select id, title, author_id from books limit 4"

main :: IO ()
main = do
conn <- SQL.connect creds
books <- selectBooks conn
print books

This yields the result set:

[ Book { id_ = 7808 , title = "The Shining" , author_id = 4156 }

, Book { id_ = 4513 , title = "Dune" , author_id = 1866 }
, Book { id_ = 4267 , title = "2001: A Space Odyssey" , author_id = 2001 }
, Book { id_ = 1608 , title = "The Cat in the Hat" , author_id = 1809 }
]

Quasiquoter
As SQL expressions grow in complexity they often span multiple lines and sometimes it’s useful to just drop down to
a quasiquoter to embed the whole query. The quoter here is pure, and just generates the Query object behind as a
ByteString.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}
DATABASES 374

import qualified Data.Text as T

import qualified Database.PostgreSQL.Simple as SQL

import Database.PostgreSQL.Simple.SqlQQ (sql)
import Database.PostgreSQL.Simple.FromRow (FromRow(..), field)

data Book = Book

{ id_ :: Int
, title :: T.Text
, first_name :: T.Text
, last_name :: T.Text
} deriving (Show)

instance FromRow Book where

fromRow = Book <$> field <*> field <*> field <*> field

creds :: SQL.ConnectInfo
creds = SQL.defaultConnectInfo
{ SQL.connectUser = "example"
, SQL.connectPassword = "example"
, SQL.connectDatabase = "booktown"
}

selectBooks :: SQL.Query
selectBooks = [sql|
select
books.id,
books.title,
authors.first_name,
authors.last_name
from books
join authors on
authors.id = books.author_id
limit 5
|]

main :: IO ()
main = do
conn <- SQL.connect creds
(books :: [Book]) <- SQL.query_ conn selectBooks
print books

This yields the result set:

[ Book
{ id_ = 41472
, title = "Practical PostgreSQL"
, first_name = "John"
, last_name = "Worsley"
}
, Book
{ id_ = 25908
375 DATABASES

, title = "Franklin in the Dark"

, first_name = "Paulette"
, last_name = "Bourgeois"
}
, Book
{ id_ = 1234
, title = "The Velveteen Rabbit"
, first_name = "Margery Williams"
, last_name = "Bianco"
}
, Book
{ id_ = 190
, title = "Little Women"
, first_name = "Louisa May"
, last_name = "Alcott"
}
]

Sqlite
The sqlite-simple library provides a binding to the libsqlite3 which can interact with and query SQLite
databases. It provides precisely the same interface as the Postgres library of similar namesakes.

query_ :: FromRow r => Connection -> Query -> IO [r]

query :: (ToRow q, FromRow r) => Connection -> Query -> q -> IO [r]
execute :: ToRow q => Connection -> Query -> q -> IO Int64
execute_ :: Connection -> Query -> IO Int64

All datatypes can be serialised to and from result sets by defining FromRow and ToRow datatypes which map your
custom datatypes to a RowParser which convets result sets, or a serialisers which maps custom to one of the following
primitive sqlite types.
• SQLInteger
• SQLFloat
• SQLText
• SQLBlob
• SQLNull

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

import Data.Text as T
import Database.SQLite.Simple as SQL

selectBooks :: SQL.Connection -> IO [(Int, T.Text, Int)]

selectBooks conn = SQL.query_ conn "select id, title, author_id from books"

main :: IO ()
main = do
conn <- open "books.db"
DATABASES 376

books <- selectBooks conn

pure ()

For examples of serialising to datatype see the previous Postgres section as it has an identical interface.

Redis
Redis is an in­memory key­value store with support for a variety of datastructures. The Haskell exposure is exposed in a
Redis monad which sequences a set of redis commands taking ByteString arguments and then executes them against
a connection object.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Database.Redis
import Data.ByteString.Char8

session :: Redis (Either Reply (Maybe ByteString))

session = do
set "hello" "haskell"
get "hello"

main :: IO ()
main = do
conn <- connect defaultConnectInfo
res <- runRedis conn session
print res

Redis is quite often used as a lightweight pubsub server, and the bindings integrate with the Haskell concurrency primi­
tives so that listeners can be sparked and shared across threads off without blocking the main thread.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

import Database.Redis

import Control.Monad
import Control.Monad.Trans
import Data.ByteString.Char8

import Control.Concurrent

subscriber :: Redis ()
subscriber =
pubSub (subscribe ["news"]) $ \msg -> do
print msg
return mempty

publisher :: Redis ()
publisher = forM_ [1..100] $ \n -> publish "news" (pack (show n))

-- connects to localhost:6379
main :: IO ()
377 DATABASES

main = do
conn1 <- connect defaultConnectInfo
conn2 <- connect defaultConnectInfo

-- Fork off a publisher

forkIO $ runRedis conn1 publisher

-- Subscribe for messages

runRedis conn2 subscriber

Acid State
Acid­state allows us to build a “database” for around our existing Haskell datatypes that guarantees atomic transactions.
For example, we can build a simple key­value store wrapped around the Map type.

{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

import Data.Acid
import Data.Typeable
import Data.SafeCopy
import Control.Monad.Reader (ask)

import qualified Data.Map as Map

import qualified Control.Monad.State as S

type Key = String

type Value = String

data Database = Database !(Map.Map Key Value)

deriving (Show, Ord, Eq, Typeable)

$(deriveSafeCopy 0 'base ''Database)

insertKey :: Key -> Value -> Update Database ()

insertKey key value
= do Database m <- S.get
S.put (Database (Map.insert key value m))

lookupKey :: Key -> Query Database (Maybe Value)

lookupKey key
= do Database m <- ask
return (Map.lookup key m)

deleteKey :: Key -> Update Database ()

deleteKey key
= do Database m <- S.get
S.put (Database (Map.delete key m))

allKeys :: Int -> Query Database [(Key, Value)]

DATABASES 378

allKeys limit
= do Database m <- ask
return $ take limit (Map.toList m)

$(makeAcidic ''Database ['insertKey, 'lookupKey, 'allKeys, 'deleteKey])

fixtures :: Map.Map String String

fixtures = Map.empty

test :: Key -> Value -> IO ()

test key val = do
database <- openLocalStateFrom "db/" (Database fixtures)
result <- update database (InsertKey key val)
result <- query database (AllKeys 10)
print result

Selda
Selda is a object relation mapper and database abstraction which provides a higher level interface for creating database
schemas for multiple database backends, as well as a type­safe query interface which makes use of advanced type system
features to ensure integrity of queries.
Selda is very unique in that it uses the OverloadedLabels extension to query refer to database fields that map directly
to fields of records. By deriving Generic and instantiating SqlRow via DeriveAnyClass we can create databases
schemas automatically with generic deriving.

data Employee = Employee

{ id :: ID Employee
, name :: Text
, title :: Text
, companyId :: ID Company
}
deriving (Generic, SqlRow)

data Company = Company

{ id :: ID Company
, name :: Text
}
deriving (Generic, SqlRow)

instance SqlRow Employee

instance SqlRow Company

The tables themselves can be named, annotated with metadata about constraints and foreign keys and assigned to a
Haskell value.

employees :: Table Employee

employees = table "employees" [#id :- autoPrimary, #companyId :- foreignKey companies #id]

companies :: Table Company

companies = table "companies" [#id :- autoPrimary]
379 DATABASES

This table can then be generated and populated.

main :: IO ()
main = withSQLite "company.sqlite" $ do
createTable employees
createTable companies
-- Populate companies
insert_
companies
[Company (toId 0) "Dunder Mifflin Inc."]
-- Populate employees
insert_
employees
[ Employee (toId 0) "Michael Scott" "Director" (toId 0),
Employee (toId 1) "Dwight Schrute" "Regional Manager" (toId 0)
]

This will generate the following Sqlite DDL to instantiate the tables directly from the types of the Haskell data strutures.

CREATE TABLEIF NOT EXISTS "companies"

(
"id" integer PRIMARY KEY autoincrement NOT NULL,
"name" text NOT NULL
);

CREATE TABLEIF NOT EXISTS "employees"

(
"id" integer PRIMARY KEY autoincrement NOT NULL,
"name" text NOT NULL,
"title" text NOT NULL,
"companyId" integer NOT NULL,
CONSTRAINT "fk0_companyId" FOREIGN KEY ("companyId") REFERENCES "companies"("id" )
);

Selda also provides an embedded query language for specifying type­safe queries by allowing you to add the overloaded
labels to work with these values directly as SQL selectors.

select :: Relational a => Table a -> Query s (Row s a)

insert :: (MonadSelda m, Relational a) => Table a -> [a] -> m Int
query :: (MonadSelda m, Result a) => Query (Backend m) a -> m [Res a]
from :: (Typeable t, SqlType a) => Selector t a -> Query s (Row s t) -> Query s (Col s a)

restrict :: Same s t => Col s Bool -> Query t ()

order :: (Same s t, SqlType a) => Col s a -> Order -> Query t ()

An example SELECT SQL query:

exampleSelect :: IO ([Employee], [Company])

exampleSelect = withSQLite "company.sqlite" $
query $ do
employee <- select employees
DATABASES 380

restrict (employee ! #id .>= 1)

Chapter 30

GHC

Compiler Design
The flow of code through GHC is a process of translation between several intermediate languages and optimizations and
transformations thereof. A common pattern for many of these AST types is they are parametrized over a binder type and
at various stages the binders will be transformed, for example the Renamer pass effectively translates the HsSyn datatype
from a AST parametrized over literal strings as the user enters into a HsSyn parameterized over qualified names that
includes modules and package names into a higher level Name type.

GHC Compiler Passes

• Parser/Frontend: An enormous AST translated from human syntax that makes explicit all possible expressible
syntax ( declarations, do­notation, where clauses, syntax extensions, template haskell, … ). This is unfiltered
Haskell and it is enormous.
• Renamer takes syntax from the frontend and transforms all names to be qualified ( base:Prelude.map instead
of map ) and any shadowed names in lambda binders transformed into unique names.
• Typechecker is a large pass that serves two purposes, first is the core type bidirectional inference engine where most
of the work happens and the translation between the frontend Core syntax.
• Desugarer translates several higher level syntactic constructors
– where statements are turned into (possibly recursive) nested let statements.
– Nested pattern matches are expanded out into splitting trees of case statements.
– do­notation is expanded into explicit bind statements.
– Lots of others.
• Simplifier transforms many Core constructs into forms that are more adaptable to compilation. For example let
statements will be floated or raised, pattern matches will simplified, inner loops will be pulled out and transformed
into more optimal forms. Non­intuitively the resulting may actually be much more complex (for humans) after
going through the simplifier!
• Stg pass translates the resulting Core into STG (Spineless Tagless G­Machine) which effectively makes all laziness
explicit and encodes the thunks and update frames that will be handled during evaluation.
• Codegen/Cmm pass will then translate STG into Cmm a simple imperative language that manifests the low­level
implementation details of runtime types. The runtime closure types and stack frames are made explicit and low­
level information about the data and code (arity, updatability, free variables, pointer layout) made manifest in the
info tables present on most constructs.
• Native Code The final pass will than translate the resulting code into either LLVM or Assembly via either through
GHC’s home built native code generator (NCG) or the LLVM backend.

Information for each pass can be dumped out via a rather large collection of flags. The GHC internals are very ac­
cessible although some passes are somewhat easier to understand than others. Most of the time -ddump-simpl and

381
GHC 382

-ddump-stg are sufficient to get an understanding of how the code will compile, unless of course you’re dealing with
very specialized optimizations or hacking on GHC itself.

Flag Action
-ddump-parsed Frontend AST.
-ddump-rn Output of the rename pass.
-ddump-tc Output of the typechecker.
-ddump-splices Output of TemplateHaskell splices.
-ddump-types Typed AST representation.
-ddump-deriv Output of deriving instances.
-ddump-ds Output of the desugar pass.
-ddump-spec Output of specialisation pass.
-ddump-rules Output of applying rewrite rules.
-ddump-vect Output results of vectorize pass.
-ddump-simpl Output of the SimplCore pass.
-ddump-inlinings Output of the inliner.
-ddump-cse Output of the common subexpression elimination pass.
-ddump-prep The CorePrep pass.
-ddump-stg The resulting STG.
-ddump-cmm The resulting Cmm.
-ddump-opt-cmm The resulting Cmm optimization pass.
-ddump-asm The final assembly generated.
-ddump-llvm The final LLVM IR generated.

GHC API
GHC can be used as a library to manipulate and transform Haskell source code into executable code. It consists of many
functions, the primary drivers in the pipeline are outlined below.

-- Parse a module.
parseModule :: GhcMonad m => ModSummary -> m ParsedModule

-- Typecheck and rename a parsed module.

typecheckModule :: GhcMonad m => ParsedModule -> m TypecheckedModule

-- Desugar a typechecked module.

desugarModule :: GhcMonad m => TypecheckedModule -> m DesugaredModule

-- Generated ModIface and Generated Code

loadModule :: (TypecheckedMod mod, GhcMonad m) => mod -> m mod

The output of these functions consists of four main data structures:

• ParsedModule
• TypecheckedModule
• DesugaredModule
• CoreModule
GHC itself can be used as a library just as any other library. The example below compiles a simple source module “B”
that contains no code.
383 GHC

import GHC
import GHC.Paths (libdir)
import DynFlags

targetFile :: FilePath
targetFile = "B.hs"

example :: IO ()
example =
defaultErrorHandler defaultFatalMessager defaultFlushOut $ do
runGhc (Just libdir) $ do
dflags <- getSessionDynFlags
setSessionDynFlags dflags

target <- guessTarget targetFile Nothing

setTargets [target]
load LoadAllTargets
modSum <- getModSummary $ mkModuleName "B"

p <- parseModule modSum -- ModuleSummary

t <- typecheckModule p -- TypecheckedSource
d <- desugarModule t -- DesugaredModule
l <- loadModule d
let c = coreModule d -- CoreModule
g <- getModuleGraph
mapM showModule g
return c

main :: IO ()
main = do
res <- example
putStrLn $ showSDoc ( ppr res )

DynFlags
The internal compiler state of GHC is largely driven from a set of many configuration flags known as DynFlags. These
flags are largely divided into four categories:

• Dump Flags
• Warning Flags
• Extension Flags
• General Flags

These are flags are set via the following modifier functions:

dopt_set :: DynFlags -> DumpFlag -> DynFlags

wopt_set :: DynFlags -> WarningFlag -> DynFlags
xopt_set :: DynFlags -> Extension -> DynFlags
gopt_set :: DynFlags -> GeneralFlag -> DynFlags

See:
GHC 384

• DynFlags

Package Databases
A package is a library of Haskell modules known to the compiler. Compilation of a Haskell module through Cabal uses a
directory structure known as a package database. This directory is named package.conf.d , and contains a file for each
package used for compiling a module and is combined with a binary cache of package’s cabal data in package.cache .

When Cabal operates it stores the active package database in the environment variable: GHC_PACKAGE_PATH
To see which packages are currently available, use the ghc­pkg list command:

$ ghc-pkg list
/home/sdiehl/.ghcup/ghc/8.6.5/lib/ghc-8.6.5/package.conf.d
Cabal-2.4.0.1
array-0.5.3.0
base-4.12.0.0
binary-0.8.6.0
bytestring-0.10.8.2
containers-0.6.0.1
deepseq-1.4.4.0
directory-1.3.3.0
filepath-1.4.2.1
ghc-8.6.5
ghc-boot-8.6.5
ghc-boot-th-8.6.5
ghc-compact-0.1.0.0
ghc-heap-8.6.5
ghc-prim-0.5.3
ghci-8.6.5
haskeline-0.7.4.3
hpc-0.6.0.3
integer-gmp-1.0.2.0
libiserv-8.6.3
mtl-2.2.2
parsec-3.1.13.0
pretty-1.1.3.6
process-1.6.5.0
rts-1.0
stm-2.5.0.0
template-haskell-2.14.0.0
terminfo-0.4.1.2
text-1.2.3.1
time-1.8.0.2
transformers-0.5.6.2
unix-2.7.2.2
xhtml-3000.2.2.1

The package database can be queried for specific metadata of the cabal files associated with each package. For example
to query the version of base library currently used for compilation we can query from the ghc-pkg command:

$ ghc-pkg field base version

version: 4.12.0.0
385 GHC

$ ghc-pkg field rts license

license: BSD-3-Clause

$ ghc-pkg field haskeline exposed-modules

exposed-modules:
System.Console.Haskeline System.Console.Haskeline.Completion
System.Console.Haskeline.History System.Console.Haskeline.IO
System.Console.Haskeline.MonadException

HIE Bios
A session is fully specified by a set GHC dynflags that are needed to compile a module. Typically when the compiler is
invoked by Cabal these are all generated during compilation time. These flags contain the entire transitive dependency
graph of the module, the language extensions and the file system locations of all paths. Given the bifucation of many of
these tools setting up the GHC environment from inside of libraries has been non­trivial in the past. HIE­bios is a new
library which can read package metadata from Cabal and Stack files and dynamically set up the appropriate session for
a project.
Hie­bios will read a Cradle file ( hie.yaml ) file in the root of the workspace which describes how to setup the environ­
ment. For example for using Stack this file would contain:

cradle: {stack: {component: "myproject:lib" }}

While using Cabal the file would contain:

cradle: {cabal: {component: "myproject:lib" }}

This is particularly useful for projects that require access to the internal compiler artifacts or do static analysis on top of
Haskell code. An example of setting a compiler session from a cradle is shown below:

import Control.Monad.Trans
import DynFlags
import GHC
import GHC.LanguageExtensions.Type
import GHC.Paths
import GhcMonad
import HIE.Bios
import InteractiveEval
import Outputable

example :: Ghc ()
example = do
cradle <- liftIO (loadImplicitCradle ".")
comp <- liftIO $ getCompilerOptions "." cradle
case comp of
CradleSuccess r -> do
liftIO (print "Success")
session <- initSession r
dflags <- getSessionDynFlags
let dflags' = foldl xopt_set dflags [ImplicitPrelude]
GHC 386

setSessionDynFlags
dflags'
{ hscTarget = HscInterpreted,
ghcLink = LinkInMemory,
ghcMode = CompManager
}
liftIO (putStrLn (showSDoc dflags (ppr session)))
CradleFail err -> liftIO $ print err
CradleNone -> liftIO $ print "No cradle"
pure ()

main :: IO ()
main = runGhc (Just GHC.Paths.libdir) example

Abstract Syntax Tree

GHC uses several syntax trees during its compilation. These are defined in the following modules:
• HsExpr ­ Syntax tree for the frontend of GHC compiler.
• StgSyn ­ Syntax tree of STG intermediate representation
• Cmm ­ Syntax tree for the CMM intermediate representation
GHC’s frontend source tree are grouped into datatypes for the following language constructs and use the naming con­
vention:
• Binds ­ Declarations of functions. For example the body of a class declaration or class instance.
• Decl ­ Declarations of datatypes, types, newtypes, etc.
• Expr ­ Expressions. For example, let statements, lambdas, if­blocks, do­blocks, etc.
• Lit ­ Literals. For example, integers, characters, strings, etc.
• Module ­ Modules including import declarations, exports and pragmas.
• Name ­ Names that occur in other constructs. Such as modules names, constructors and variables.
• Pat ­ Patterns that occur in case statements and binders.
• Type ­ Type syntax that occurs in toplevel signatures and explicit annotations.

Generally all AST in the frontend of the compiler is annotated with position information that is kept around to give
better error reporting about the provenance of the specific problematic set of the syntax tree. This is done through a
datatype GenLocated with attaches the position information l to element e .

data GenLocated l e = L l e
deriving (Eq, Ord, Data, Functor, Foldable, Traversable)

type Located = GenLocated SrcSpan

For example, the type of located source expressions is defined by the type:

type LHsExpr p = Located (HsExpr p)

data HsExpr p
= HsVar (XVar p) (Located (IdP p))
| HsLam (XLam p) (MatchGroup p (LHsExpr p))
| HsApp (XApp p) (LHsExpr p) (LHsExpr p)
...
387 GHC

The HsSyn AST is reused across multiple compiler passes.

data GhcPass (c :: Pass)

data Pass = Parsed | Renamed | Typechecked

type GhcPs = GhcPass 'Parsed

type GhcRn = GhcPass 'Renamed
type GhcTc = GhcPass 'Typechecked

type family IdP p

type instance IdP GhcPs = RdrName
type instance IdP GhcRn = Name
type instance IdP GhcTc = Id

type LIdP p = Located (IdP p)

Individual elements of the syntax are defined by type families which a single parameter for the pass.

type family XVar x

type family XLam x
type family XApp x

The type of HsExpr used in the parser pass can then be defined simply as LHsExpr GhcPs and from the typechecker
pass LHsExpr GhcTc .
Names
GHC has an interesting zoo of names it uses internally for identifiers in the syntax tree. There are more than the following
but these are the primary ones you will see most often:
• RdrName ­ Names that come directly from the parser without metadata.
• OccName ­ Names with metadata about the namespace the variable is in.
• Name ­ A unique name introduced during the renamer pass with metadata about its provenance.
• Var ­ A typed variable name with metadata about its use sites.
• Id ­ A term­level identifier. Type Synonym for Var.
• TyVar ­ A type­level identifier. Type Synonym for Var.
• TcTyVar ­ A type variable used in the typechecker. Type Synonym for Var.
See: Trees That Grow

Parser
The GHC parser is itself written in Happy. It defines its Parser monad as the following definition which emits a sequences
of Located tokens with the lexemes position information. The parser is embedded inside the P monad.

%monad { P } { >>= } { return }

%lexer { (lexer True) } { L _ ITeof }
%tokentype { (Located Token) }

Since there are many flavours of Haskell syntax enabled by language syntax extensions, the monad parser itself is passed
a specific set of DynFlags which specify the language specific Haskell syntax to parse. An example parser invocation
would look like:
GHC 388

runParser :: DynFlags -> String -> P a -> ParseResult a

runParser flags str parser = unP parser parseState
where
filename = "<interactive>"
location = mkRealSrcLoc (mkFastString filename) 1 1
buffer = stringToStringBuffer str
parseState = mkPState flags buffer location

The parser argument above can be one of the following Happy entry point functions which parse different fragments
of the Haskell grammar.
• parseModule
• parseSignature
• parseStatement
• parseDeclaration
• parseExpression
• parseTypeSignature
• parseStmt
• parseIdentifier
• parseType

See:
• GHC Lexer.x
• GHC Parser.y
• ghc­lib­parser

Outputable
GHC internally use a pretty printer class for rendering its core structures out to text. This is based on the Wadler­Leijen
style and uses a Outputable class as its interface:

class Outputable a where

ppr :: a -> SDoc
pprPrec :: Rational -> a -> SDoc

The primary renderer for SDoc types is showSDoc which takes as argument a set of DynFlags which determine how the
structure are printed.

showSDoc :: DynFlags -> SDoc -> String

We can also cheat and use a unsafe show which uses a dummy set of DynFlags.

-- | Show a GHC.Outputable structure

showGhc :: (GHC.Outputable a) => a -> String
showGhc = GHC.showPpr GHC.unsafeGlobalDynFlags

See:
• Outputable
389 GHC

Datatypes
GHC has many datatypes but several of them are central data structures that are the core datatypes that are manipulated
during compilation. These are divided into seven core categories.
Monads
The GHC monads which encapsulate the compiler driver pipeline and statefully hold the interactions between the user
and the internal compiler phases.
• GHC ­ The toplevel GHC monad that contains the compiler driver.
• P ­ The parser monad.
• Hsc ­ The compiler module for a single module.
• TcRn ­ The monad holding state for typechecker and renamer passes.
• DsM ­ The monad holding state for desugaring pass.
• SimplM ­ The monad holding state of simplification pass.
• MonadUnique ­ A monad for generating unique identifiers
Names
• ModuleName ­ A qualified module name.
• Name ­ A unique name generated after renaming pass with provenance information of the symbol.
• Var ­ A typed Name .
• Type ­ The representation of a type in the GHC type system.
• RdrName ­ A name generated from the parser without scoping or type information.
• Token ­ Alex lexer tokens
• SrcLoc ­ The position information of a lexeme within the source code.
• SrcSpan ­ The span information of a lexeme within the source code.
• Located ­ Source code location newtype wrapper for AST containing position and span information.

Session
• DynFlags ­ A mutable state holding all compiler flags and options for compiling a project.
• HscEnv ­ An immutable monad state holding the flags and session for compiling a single module.
• Settings ­ Immutable datatype holding holding system settings, architecture and paths for compilation.
• Target ­ A compilation target.
• TargetId ­ Name of a compilation target, either module or file.
• HscTarget ­ Target code output. Either LLVM, ASM or interpreted.
• GhcMode ­ Operation mode of GHC, either multi­module compilation or single shot.
• ModSummary ­ An element in a project’s module graph containing file information and graph location.
• InteractiveContext ­ Context for GHCI interactive shell when using interpreter target.
• TypeEnv ­ A symbol table mapping from Names to TyThings.
• GlobalRdrEnv ­ A symbol table mapping RdrName to GlobalRdrElt .
• GlobalRdrElt ­ A symbol emitted by the parser with provenance about where it was defined and brought into
scope.
• TcGblEnv ­ A symbol table generated after a module is completed typechecking.
• FixityEnv ­ A symbol table mapping infix operators to fixity delcarations.
• Module ­ A module name and identifier.
• ModGuts ­ The total state of all passes accumulated by compiling a module. After compilation ModIFace and
ModDetails are kept.
• ModuleInfo ­ Container for information about a Module.
• ModDetails ­ Data structure summarises all metadata about a compiled module.
• AvailInfo ­ Symbol table of what objects are in scope.
• Class ­ Data structure holding all metadata about a typeclass definition.
• ClsInt ­ Data structure holding all metadata about a typeclass instance.
• FamInst ­ Data structure holding all metadata about a type/data family instance declaration.
GHC 390

• TyCon ­ Data structure holding all metadata about a type constructor.

• DataCon ­ Data structure holding all metadata about a data constructor.
• InstEnv ­ A InstEnv hodlings a mapping of known instances for that family.
• TyThing ­ A global name with a type attached. Classified by namespace.
• DataConRep ­ Data constructor representation generated from parser.
• GhcException ­ Exceptions thrown by GHC inside of Hsc monad for aberrant compiler behavior. Panics or
internal errors.
HsSyn
• HsModule ­ Haskell source module containing all toplevel definitions, pragmas and imports.
• HsBind ­ Universal type for any Haskell binding mapping names to scope.
• HsDecl ­ Toplevel declaration in a module.
• HsGroup ­ A classifier type of toplevel decalarations.
• HsExpr ­ An expression used in a declaration.
• HsLit ­ An literal expression (number, character, char, etc) used in a declaration.
• Pat ­ A pattern match occuring in a function declaration of left of a pattern binding.
• HsType ­ Haskell source representation of a type­level expression.
• Literal ­ Haskell source representation of a literal mapping to either a literal numeric type or a machine type.
CoreSyn
The core syntax is a very small set of constructors for the Core intermediate language. Most of the datatypes are contained
in the Expr datatype. All core expressions consists of toplevel Bind of expressions objects.

• Expr ­ Core expression.

• Bind ­ Core binder, either recursive or non­recursive.
• Arg ­ Expression that occur in function arguments.
• Alt ­ A pattern match case split alternative.
• AltCon ­ A case alterantive constructor.

StgSyn
Spineless tagless G­machine or STG is the intermediate representation GHC uses before generating native code. It is an
even simpler language than Core and models a virtual machine which maps to the native compilation target.
• StgTopBinding ­ A toplevel module STG binding.
• StgBinding ­ An STG binding, either recursive or non­recursive.
• StgExpr ­ A STG expression over Id names.
– StgApp ­ Application of a function to a fixed set of arguments.
– StgLit ­ An expression literal.
– StgConApp ­ An application of a data constructor to a fixed set of values.
– StgOpApp ­ An application of a primop to a fixed set of arguments.
– StgLam ­ An STG lambda binding.
– StgCase ­ An STG case expansion.
– StgLet ­ An STG let binding.

Core
Core is the explicitly typed System­F family syntax through which all Haskell constructs can be expressed.

data Bind b
= NonRec b (Expr b)
391 GHC

| Rec [(b, Expr b)]

data Expr b
= Var Id
| Lit Literal
| App (Expr b) (Arg b)
| Lam b (Expr b)
| Let (Bind b) (Expr b)
| Case (Expr b) b Type [Alt b]
| Cast (Expr b) Coercion
| Tick (Tickish Id) (Expr b)
| Type Type
| Coercion Coercion

To inspect the core from GHCi we can invoke it using the following flags and the following shell alias. We have explicitly
disabled the printing of certain metadata and longform names to make the representation easier to read.

alias ghci-core="ghci -ddump-simpl -dsuppress-idinfo \

-dsuppress-coercions -dsuppress-type-applications \
-dsuppress-uniques -dsuppress-module-prefixes"

At the interactive prompt we can then explore the core representation interactively:

$ ghci-core
λ: let f x = x + 2 ; f :: Int -> Int

==================== Simplified expression ====================

returnIO
(: ((\ (x :: Int) -> + $fNumInt x (I# 2)) `cast` ...) ([]))

λ: let f x = (x, x)

==================== Simplified expression ====================

returnIO (: ((\ (@ t) (x :: t) -> (x, x)) `cast` ...) ([]))

ghc­core is also very useful for looking at GHC’s compilation artifacts.

$ ghc-core --no-cast --no-asm

Alternatively the major stages of the compiler ( parse tree, core, stg, cmm, asm ) can be manually outputted and inspected
by passing several flags to the compiler:

$ ghc -ddump-to-file -ddump-parsed -ddump-simpl -ddump-stg -ddump-cmm -ddump-asm

Reading Core

Core from GHC is roughly human readable, but it’s helpful to look at simple human written examples to get the hang
of what’s going on.
GHC 392

id :: a -> a
id x = x

id :: forall a. a -> a
id = \ (@ a) (x :: a) -> x

idInt :: GHC.Types.Int -> GHC.Types.Int

idInt = id @ GHC.Types.Int

compose :: (b -> c) -> (a -> b) -> a -> c

compose f g x = f (g x)

compose :: forall b c a. (b -> c) -> (a -> b) -> a -> c

compose = \ (@ b) (@ c) (@ a) (f1 :: b -> c) (g :: a -> b) (x1 :: a) -> f1 (g x1)

map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]

map f [] = []
map f (x:xs) = f x : map f xs

map :: forall a b. (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]

map =
\ (@ a) (@ b) (f :: a -> b) (xs :: [a]) ->
case xs of _ {
[] -> [] @ b;
: y ys -> : @ b (f y) (map @ a @ b f ys)
}

Machine generated names are created for a lot of transformation of Core. Generally they consist of a prefix and unique
identifier. The prefix is often pass specific ( e.g ds for desugar generated names) and sometimes specific names are
generated for specific automatically generated code. A list of the common prefixes and their meaning is show below.

Prefix Description
$f... Dict­fun identifiers (from inst decls)
$dmop Default method for ‘op’
$wf Worker for function ‘f ’
$sf Specialised version of f
$gdm Generated class method
$d Dictionary names
$s Specialized function name
$f Foreign export
$pnC n’th superclass selector for class C
T:C Tycon for dictionary for class C
D:C Data constructor for dictionary for class C
NTCo:T Coercion for newtype T to its underlying runtime representation
393 GHC

Of important note is that the Λ and λ for type­level and value­level lambda abstraction are represented by the same
symbol ( \ ) in core, which is a simplifying detail of the GHC’s implementation but a source of some confusion when
starting.

-- System-F Notation
Λ b c a. λ (f1 : b -> c) (g : a -> b) (x1 : a). f1 (g x1)

-- Haskell Core
\ (@ b) (@ c) (@ a) (f1 :: b -> c) (g :: a -> b) (x1 :: a) -> f1 (g x1)

The seq function has an intuitive implementation in the Core language.

x `seq` y

case x of _ {
__DEFAULT -> y
}

One particularly notable case of the Core desugaring process is that pattern matching on overloaded numbers implicitly
translates into equality test (i.e. Eq ).

f 0 = 1
f 1 = 2
f 2 = 3
f 3 = 4
f 4 = 5
f _ = 0

f :: forall a b. (Eq a, Num a, Num b) => a -> b

f =
\ (@ a)
(@ b)
($dEq :: Eq a)
($dNum :: Num a)
($dNum1 :: Num b)
(ds :: a) ->
case == $dEq ds (fromInteger $dNum (__integer 0)) of _ {
False ->
case == $dEq ds (fromInteger $dNum (__integer 1)) of _ {
False ->
case == $dEq ds (fromInteger $dNum (__integer 2)) of _ {
False ->
case == $dEq ds (fromInteger $dNum (__integer 3)) of _ {
False ->
case == $dEq ds (fromInteger $dNum (__integer 4)) of _ {
False -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 0);
True -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 5)
};
True -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 4)
};
GHC 394

True -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 3)

};
True -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 2)
};
True -> fromInteger $dNum1 (__integer 1)
}

Of course, adding a concrete type signature changes the desugar just matching on the unboxed values.

f :: Int -> Int

f =
\ (ds :: Int) ->
case ds of _ { I# ds1 ->
case ds1 of _ {
__DEFAULT -> I# 0;
0 -> I# 1;
1 -> I# 2;
2 -> I# 3;
3 -> I# 4;
4 -> I# 5
}
}

See:

• Core Spec
• CoreSynType

Inliner
infixr 0 $

($):: (a -> b) -> a -> b

f $ x = f x

Having to enter a secondary closure every time we used ($) would introduce an enormous overhead. Fortunately GHC
has a pass to eliminate small functions like this by simply replacing the function call with the body of its definition at
appropriate call­sites. The compiler contains a variety of heuristics for determining when this kind of substitution is
appropriate and the potential costs involved.

In addition to the automatic inliner, manual pragmas are provided for more granular control over inlining. It’s important
to note that naive inlining quite often results in significantly worse performance and longer compilation times.

{-# INLINE func #-}

{-# INLINABLE func #-}
{-# NOINLINE func #-}

For example the contrived case where we apply a binary function to two arguments. The function body is small and
instead of entering another closure just to apply the given function, we could in fact just inline the function application
at the call site.
395 GHC

{-# INLINE foo #-}

{-# NOINLINE bar #-}

foo :: (a -> b -> c) -> a -> b -> c

foo f x y = f x y

bar :: (a -> b -> c) -> a -> b -> c

bar f x y = f x y

test1 :: Int
test1 = foo (+) 10 20

test2 :: Int
test2 = bar (+) 20 30

Looking at the core, we can see that in test1 the function has indeed been expanded at the call site and simply performs
the addition there instead of another indirection.

test1 :: Int
test1 =
let {
f :: Int -> Int -> Int
f = + $fNumInt } in
let {
x :: Int
x = I# 10 } in
let {
y :: Int
y = I# 20 } in
f x y

test2 :: Int
test2 = bar (+ $fNumInt) (I# 20) (I# 30)

Cases marked with NOINLINE generally indicate that the logic in the function is using something like unsafePerformIO
or some other unholy function. In these cases naive inlining might duplicate effects at multiple call­sites throughout the
program which would be undesirable.
See:
• Secrets of the Glasgow Haskell Compiler inliner

Primops
GHC has many primitive operations that are intrinsics built into the compiler. You can manually invoke these functions
inside of optimised code which allows you to drop down to the same level of performance you can achieve in C or by
hand­writing inline assembly. These functions are intrinsics that are builtin to the compiler and operate over unboxed
machines types.

(+#) :: Int# -> Int# -> Int#

gtChar# :: Char# -> Char# -> Int#
GHC 396

byteSwap64# :: Word# -> Word#

Depending on the choice of code generator and CPU architecture these instructions will map to single CPU instructions
over machines.
See ghc­prim

SIMD Intrinsics
GHC has procedures for generating code that use SIMD vector instructions when using the LLVM backend ( -fllvm ).
For example the following <8xfloat> and <8xdouble> are used internally by the following datatypes exposed by
ghc-prim .

• FloatX8#
• DoubleX8#
And operations over these map to single CPU instructions that work with the bulk values instead of single values. For
instance adding two vectors:

-- Add two vectors element-wise.

plusDoubleX8# :: DoubleX8# -> DoubleX8# -> DoubleX8#

For example:

{-# LANGUAGE BangPatterns #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UnboxedTuples #-}
{-# OPTIONS_GHC -mavx #-}
{-# OPTIONS_GHC -msse #-}
{-# OPTIONS_GHC -msse2 #-}
{-# OPTIONS_GHC -msse4 #-}

import GHC.Exts
import GHC.Prim

data ByteArray = BA (MutableByteArray# RealWorld)

data FloatX4 = FX4# FloatX4#

instance Show FloatX4 where

show (FX4# f) = case unpackFloatX4# f of
(# a, b, c, d #) -> show (F# a, F# b, F# c, F# d)

main :: IO ()
main = do
let a = packFloatX4# (# 4.5#, 7.8#, 2.3#, 6.5# #)
let b = packFloatX4# (# 8.2#, 6.3#, 4.7#, 9.2# #)
let c = FX4# (broadcastFloatX4# 1.5#)
print (FX4# a)
print (FX4# (plusFloatX4# a b))
print c
397 GHC

When you generate this code to LLVM you will see that GHC is indeed allocating the values as vector types if you browse
the assembly output.

%XMM1_Var = alloca <4 x i32>, i32 1

store <4 x i32> undef, <4 x i32>* %XMM1_Var, align 1

Using the native SIMD instructions you can perform low­level vectorised operations over the unboxed memory, typically
found in numerical computing problems.
See: SIMD Operations

Rewrite Rules
Consider the composition of two fmaps. This operation maps a function g over a list xs and then maps a function
f over the resulting list. This results in two full traversals of a list of length n.

map f (map g xs)

This is equivalent to the following more efficient form which applies the composition of f and g over the list elementwise
resulting in a single iteration of the list instead. For large lists this will be vastly more efficient.

map (f.g) xs

GHC is a clever compiler and allows us to write custom rules to transform the AST of our programs at compile time in
order to do these kind of optimisations. These are called fusion rules and many high­performance libraries make use of
them to generate more optimal code.
By adding a RULES pragma to a module where map is defined we can tell GHC to rewrite all cases of double map to
their more optimal form across all modules that use this definition. Rule are applied during the optimiser pass in GHC
compilation.

{-# RULES "map/map" forall f g xs. map f (map g xs) = map (f.g) xs #-}

It is important to note that these rewrite rules must be syntactically valid Haskell, but GHC makes no guarantees that
they are semantically valid. One could very easily introduce a rewrite rule that introduces subtle bugs by redefining
functions nonsensically and GHC will happily rewrite away. Be careful when doing these kind of optimisations.
• List Fusion

Boot Libraries
GHC itself ships with a variety of libraries that are necessary to bootstrap the compiler and compile itself.
• array ­ Mutable and immutable array data structures.
• base ­ The base library. See Base.
• binary ­ Binary serialisation to ByteStrings
• bytestring ­ Unboxed arrays of bytes.
• Cabal ­ The Cabal build system.
• containers ­ The default data structures.
• deepseq ­ Deeply evaluate nested data structures.
• directory ­ Directory and file traversal.
• dist­haddock ­ Haddock build utilities.
GHC 398

• filepath ­ File path manipulation.

• ghc­boot ­ Shared datatypes for GHC package databases
• ghc­boot­th ­ Shared datatypes for GHC and TemplateHaskell iserv
• ghc­compact ­ GHC support for compact memory regions.
• ghc­heap ­ C library for Haskell GC types.
• ghci ­ GHCI interactive shell.
• ghc­prim ­ GHC builtin primitive operations.
• haskeline ­ Readline library.
• hpc ­ Code coverage reporting.
• integer­gmp ­ GMP integer datatypes for GHC.
• libiserv ­ External interpreter for Template Haskell.
• mtl ­ Monad transformers library.
• parsec ­ Parser combinators.
• pretty ­ Pretty printer.
• process ­ Operating system process utilities.
• stm ­ Software transaction memory.
• template­haskell ­ Metaprogramming for GHC.
• terminfo ­ System terminal information.
• text ­ Unboxed arrays of Unicode characters.
• time ­ System time.
• transformers ­ Monad transformers library.
• unix ­ Interactions with Linux operating system.
• xhtml ­ HTML generation utilities.

Dictionaries
The Haskell language defines the notion of Typeclasses but is agnostic to how they are implemented in a Haskell compiler.
GHC’s particular implementation uses a pass called the dictionary passing translation part of the elaboration phase of the
typechecker which translates Core functions with typeclass constraints into implicit parameters of which record­like
structures containing the function implementations are passed.

class Num a where

(+) :: a -> a -> a
(*) :: a -> a -> a
negate :: a -> a

This class can be thought as the implementation equivalent to the following parameterized record of functions.

data DNum a = DNum (a -> a -> a) (a -> a -> a) (a -> a)

add (DNum a m n) = a
mul (DNum a m n) = m
neg (DNum a m n) = n

numDInt :: DNum Int

numDInt = DNum plusInt timesInt negateInt

numDFloat :: DNum Float

numDFloat = DNum plusFloat timesFloat negateFloat
399 GHC

+ :: forall a. Num a => a -> a -> a

+ = \ (@ a) (tpl :: Num a) ->
case tpl of _ { D:Num tpl _ _ -> tpl }

* :: forall a. Num a => a -> a -> a

* = \ (@ a) (tpl :: Num a) ->
case tpl of _ { D:Num _ tpl _ -> tpl }

negate :: forall a. Num a => a -> a

negate = \ (@ a) (tpl :: Num a) ->
case tpl of _ { D:Num _ _ tpl -> tpl }

Num and Ord have simple translations but for monads with existential type variables in their signatures, the only way
to represent the equivalent dictionary is using RankNTypes . In addition a typeclass may also include superclasses which
would be included in the typeclass dictionary and parameterized over the same arguments and an implicit superclass
constructor function is created to pull out functions from the superclass for the current monad.

data DMonad m = DMonad

{ bind :: forall a b. m a -> (a -> m b) -> m b
, return :: forall a. a -> m a
}

class (Functor t, Foldable t) => Traversable t where

traverse :: Applicative f => (a -> f b) -> t a -> f (t b)
traverse f = sequenceA . fmap f

data DTraversable t = DTraversable

{ dFunctorTraversable :: DFunctor t -- superclass dictionary
, dFoldableTraversable :: DFoldable t -- superclass dictionary
, traverse :: forall a. Applicative f => (a -> f b) -> t a -> f (t b)
}

Indeed this is not that far from how GHC actually implements typeclasses. It elaborates into projection functions and
data constructors nearly identical to this, and are expanded out to a dictionary argument for each typeclass constraint of
every polymorphic function.

Specialization
Overloading in Haskell is normally not entirely free by default, although with an optimization called specialization it
can be made to have zero cost at specific points in the code where performance is crucial. This is not enabled by default
by virtue of the fact that GHC is not a whole­program optimizing compiler and most optimizations ( not all ) stop at
module boundaries.
GHC’s method of implementing typeclasses means that explicit dictionaries are threaded around implicitly throughout
the call sites. This is normally the most natural way to implement this functionality since it preserves separate compilation.
A function can be compiled independently of where it is declared, not recompiled at every point in the program where
it’s called. The dictionary passing allows the caller to thread the implementation logic for the types to the call­site where
it can then be used throughout the body of the function.
Of course this means that in order to get at a specific typeclass function we need to project ( possibly multiple times )
GHC 400

into the dictionary structure to pluck out the function reference. The runtime makes this very cheap but not entirely
free.
Many C++ compilers or whole program optimizing compilers do the opposite however, they explicitly specialize each and
every function at the call site replacing the overloaded function with its type­specific implementation. We can selectively
enable this kind of behavior using class specialization.

module Specialize (spec, nonspec, f) where

{-# SPECIALIZE INLINE f :: Double -> Double -> Double #-}

f :: Floating a => a -> a -> a

f x y = exp (x + y) * exp (x + y)

nonspec :: Float
nonspec = f (10 :: Float) (20 :: Float)

spec :: Double
spec = f (10 :: Double) (20 :: Double)

Non­specialized

f :: forall a. Floating a => a -> a -> a

f =
\ (@ a) ($dFloating :: Floating a) (eta :: a) (eta1 :: a) ->
let {
a :: Fractional a
a = $p1Floating @ a $dFloating } in
let {
$dNum :: Num a
$dNum = $p1Fractional @ a a } in
* @ a
$dNum
(exp @ a $dFloating (+ @ a $dNum eta eta1))
(exp @ a $dFloating (+ @ a $dNum eta eta1))

In the specialized version the typeclass operations placed directly at the call site and are simply unboxed arithmetic. This
will map to a tight set of sequential CPU instructions and is very likely the same code generated by C.

spec :: Double
spec = D# (*## (expDouble# 30.0) (expDouble# 30.0))

The non­specialized version has to project into the typeclass dictionary ( $fFloatingFloat ) 6 times and likely go
through around 25 branches to perform the same operation.

nonspec :: Float
nonspec =
f @ Float $fFloatingFloat (F# (__float 10.0)) (F# (__float 20.0))

For a tight loop over numeric types specializing at the call site can result in orders of magnitude performance increase.
Although the cost in compile­time can often be non­trivial and when used at many function call­sites this can slow
GHC’s simplifier pass to a crawl.
401 GHC

The best advice is profile and look for large uses of dictionary projection in tight loops and then specialize and inline in
these places.
Using the SPECIALISE INLINE pragma can unintentionally cause GHC to diverge if applied over a recursive function,
it will try to specialize itself infinitely.

Static Compilation
On Linux, Haskell programs can be compiled into a standalone statically linked binary that includes the runtime statically
linked into it.

$ ghc -O2 --make -static -optc-static -optl-static -optl-pthread Example.hs

$ file Example
Example: ELF 64-bit LSB executable, x86-64, version 1 (GNU/Linux), statically linked, for GNU/Linux 2.6.32,
$ ldd Example
not a dynamic executable

In addition the file size of the resulting binary can be reduced by stripping unneeded symbols.

$ strip Example

upx can additionally be used to compress the size of the executable down further.

Unboxed Types
The usual numerics types in Haskell can be considered to be a regular algebraic datatype with special constructor argu­
ments for their underlying unboxed values. Normally unboxed types and explicit unboxing are not used in normal code,
they are wired­in to the compiler.

data Int = I# Int#

data Integer
= S# Int# -- Small integers
| J# Int# ByteArray# -- Large GMP integers

data Float = F# Float#

Syntax Primitive Type

3# GHC.Prim.Int#
3## GHC.Prim.Word#
3.14# GHC.Prim.Float#
3.14## GHC.Prim.Double#
'c'# GHC.Prim.Char#
"Haskell"## GHC.Prim.Addr#

An unboxed type has kind # and will never unify a type variable of kind * . Intuitively a type with kind * indicates
a type with a uniform runtime representation that can be used polymorphically.
• Lifted ­ Can contain a bottom term, represented by a pointer. ( Int , Any , (,) )
• Unlited ­ Cannot contain a bottom term, represented by a value on the stack. ( Int# , (#, #) )
GHC 402

{-# LANGUAGE BangPatterns #-}

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UnboxedTuples #-}

import GHC.Exts
import GHC.Prim

ex1 :: Bool
ex1 = isTrue# (gtChar# a# b#)
where
!(C# a#) = 'a'
!(C# b#) = 'b'

ex2 :: Int
ex2 = I# (a# +# b#)
where
!(I# a#) = 1
!(I# b#) = 2

ex3 :: Int
ex3 = (I# (1# +# 2# *# 3# +# 4#))

ex4 :: (Int, Int)

ex4 = (I# (dataToTag# False), I# (dataToTag# True))

The function for integer arithmetic used in the Num typeclass for Int is just pattern matching on this type to reveal
the underlying unboxed value, performing the builtin arithmetic and then performing the packing up into Int again.

plusInt :: Int -> Int -> Int

(I# x) `plusInt` (I# y) = I# (x +# y)

Where (+#) is a low level function built into GHC that maps to intrinsic integer addition instruction for the CPU.

plusInt :: Int -> Int -> Int

plusInt a b = case a of {
(I# a_) -> case b of {
(I# b_) -> I# (+# a_ b_);
};
};

Runtime values in Haskell are by default represented uniformly by a boxed StgClosure* struct which itself contains
several payload values, which can themselves either be pointers to other boxed values or to unboxed literal values that fit
within the system word size and are stored directly within the closure in memory. The layout of the box is described by
a bitmap in the header for the closure which describes which values in the payload are either pointers or non­pointers.
The unpackClosure# primop can be used to extract this information at runtime by reading off the bitmap on the
closure.

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}

{-# LANGUAGE UnboxedTuples #-}
403 GHC

--{-# OPTIONS_GHC -O1 #-}

module Main where

import Foreign
import GHC.Base
import GHC.Exts

data Size
= Size
{ ptrs :: Int,
nptrs :: Int,
size :: Int
}
deriving (Show)

unsafeSizeof :: a -> Size

unsafeSizeof a =
case unpackClosure# a of
(# x, ptrs, nptrs #) ->
let header = sizeOf (undefined :: Int)
ptr_c = I# (sizeofArray# ptrs)
nptr_c = I# (sizeofByteArray# nptrs) `div` sizeOf (undefined :: Word)
payload = I# (sizeofArray# ptrs +# sizeofByteArray# nptrs)
size = header + payload
in Size ptr_c nptr_c size

data A = A {-# UNPACK #-} !Int

data B = B Int

main :: IO ()
main = do
print (unsafeSizeof (A 42))
print (unsafeSizeof (B 42))

For example the datatype with the UNPACK pragma contains 1 non­pointer and 0 pointers.

data A = A {-# UNPACK #-} !Int

Size {ptrs = 0, nptrs = 1, size = 16}

While the default packed datatype contains 1 pointer and 0 non­pointers.

data B = B Int
Size {ptrs = 1, nptrs = 0, size = 9}

The closure representation for data constructors are also “tagged” at the runtime with the tag of the specific constructor.
This is however not a runtime type tag since there is no way to recover the type from the tag as all constructors simply
use the sequence (0, 1, 2, …). The tag is used to discriminate cases in pattern matching. The builtin dataToTag# can
be used to pluck off the tag for an arbitrary datatype. This is used in some cases when desugaring pattern matches.
GHC 404

dataToTag# :: a -> Int#

For example:

-- data Bool = False | True

-- False ~ 0
-- True ~ 1

a :: (Int, Int)
a = (I# (dataToTag# False), I# (dataToTag# True))
-- (0, 1)

-- data Ordering = LT | EQ | GT
-- LT ~ 0
-- EQ ~ 1
-- GT ~ 2

b :: (Int, Int, Int)

b = (I# (dataToTag# LT), I# (dataToTag# EQ), I# (dataToTag# GT))
-- (0, 1, 2)

-- data Either a b = Left a | Right b

-- Left ~ 0
-- Right ~ 1

c :: (Int, Int)
c = (I# (dataToTag# (Left 0)), I# (dataToTag# (Right 1)))
-- (0, 1)

String literals included in the source code are also translated into several primop operations. The Addr# type in Haskell
stands for a static contiguous buffer pre­allocated on the Haskell heap that can hold a char* sequence. The operation
unpackCString# can scan this buffer and fold it up into a list of Chars from inside Haskell.

unpackCString# :: Addr# -> [Char]

This is done in the early frontend desugarer phase, where literals are translated into Addr# inline instead of giant chain
of Cons’d characters. So our “Hello World” translates into the following Core:

-- print "Hello World"

print (unpackCString# "Hello World"#)

See:

• Unboxed Values as First­Class Citizens

IO/ST
Both the IO and the ST monad have special state in the GHC runtime and share a very similar implementation. Both
ST a and IO a are passing around an unboxed tuple of the form:
405 GHC

(# token, a #)

The RealWorld# token is “deeply magical” and doesn’t actually expand into any code when compiled, but simply
threaded around through every bind of the IO or ST monad and has several properties of being unique and not being
able to be duplicated to ensure sequential IO actions are actually sequential. unsafePerformIO can thought of as the
unique operation which discards the world token and plucks the a out, and is as the name implies not normally safe.

The PrimMonad abstracts over both these monads with an associated data family for the world token or ST thread, and
can be used to write operations that generic over both ST and IO. This is used extensively inside of the vector package
to allow vector algorithms to be written generically either inside of IO or ST.

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}

{-# LANGUAGE UnboxedTuples #-}

import GHC.IO ( IO(..) )

import GHC.Prim ( State#, RealWorld )
import GHC.Base ( realWorld# )

instance Monad IO where

m >> k = m >>= \ _ -> k
return = returnIO
(>>=) = bindIO
fail s = failIO s

returnIO :: a -> IO a
returnIO x = IO $ \ s -> (# s, x #)

bindIO :: IO a -> (a -> IO b) -> IO b

bindIO (IO m) k = IO $ \ s -> case m s of (# new_s, a #) -> unIO (k a) new_s

thenIO :: IO a -> IO b -> IO b

thenIO (IO m) k = IO $ \ s -> case m s of (# new_s, _ #) -> unIO k new_s

unIO :: IO a -> (State# RealWorld -> (# State# RealWorld, a #))

unIO (IO a) = a

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}

{-# LANGUAGE UnboxedTuples #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import GHC.IO ( IO(..) )

import GHC.ST ( ST(..) )
import GHC.Prim ( State#, RealWorld )
import GHC.Base ( realWorld# )

class Monad m => PrimMonad m where

type PrimState m
primitive :: (State# (PrimState m) -> (# State# (PrimState m), a #)) -> m a
internal :: m a -> State# (PrimState m) -> (# State# (PrimState m), a #)

instance PrimMonad IO where

GHC 406

type PrimState IO = RealWorld

primitive = IO
internal (IO p) = p

instance PrimMonad (ST s) where

type PrimState (ST s) = s
primitive = ST
internal (ST p) = p

ghc­heap­view
Through some dark runtime magic we can actually inspect the StgClosure structures at runtime using various C and
Cmm hacks to probe at the fields of the structure’s representation to the runtime. The library ghc-heap-view can be
used to introspect such things, although there is really no use for this kind of thing in everyday code it is very helpful when
studying the GHC internals to be able to inspect the runtime implementation details and get at the raw bits underlying
all Haskell types.

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}

import GHC.Exts
import GHC.HeapView

import System.Mem

main :: IO ()
main = do
-- Constr
clo <- getClosureData $! ([1,2,3] :: [Int])
print clo

-- Thunk
let thunk = id (1+1)
clo <- getClosureData thunk
print clo

-- evaluate to WHNF
thunk `seq` return ()

-- Indirection
clo <- getClosureData thunk
print clo

-- force garbage collection

performGC

-- Value
clo <- getClosureData thunk
print clo

A constructor (in this for cons constructor of list type) is represented by a CONSTR closure that holds two pointers to
the head and the tail. The integer in the head argument is a static reference to the pre­allocated number and we see a
407 GHC

single static reference in the SRT (static reference table).

ConsClosure {
info = StgInfoTable {
ptrs = 2,
nptrs = 0,
tipe = CONSTR_2_0,
srtlen = 1
},
ptrArgs = [0x000000000074aba8/1,0x00007fca10504260/2],
dataArgs = [],
pkg = "ghc-prim",
modl = "GHC.Types",
name = ":"
}

We can also observe the evaluation and update of a thunk in process ( id (1+1) ). The initial thunk is simply a thunk
type with a pointer to the code to evaluate it to a value.

ThunkClosure {
info = StgInfoTable {
ptrs = 0,
nptrs = 0,
tipe = THUNK,
srtlen = 9
},
ptrArgs = [],
dataArgs = []
}

When forced it is then evaluated and replaced with an Indirection closure which points at the computed value.

BlackholeClosure {
info = StgInfoTable {
ptrs = 1,
nptrs = 0,
tipe = BLACKHOLE,
srtlen = 0
},
indirectee = 0x00007fca10511e88/1
}

When the copying garbage collector passes over the indirection, it then simply replaces the indirection with a reference
to the actual computed value computed by indirectee so that future access does need to chase a pointer through the
indirection pointer to get the result.

ConsClosure {
info = StgInfoTable {
ptrs = 0,
nptrs = 1,
tipe = CONSTR_0_1,
srtlen = 0
GHC 408

},
ptrArgs = [],
dataArgs = [2],
pkg = "integer-gmp",
modl = "GHC.Integer.Type",
name = "S#"
}

STG
After being compiled into Core, a program is translated into a very similar intermediate form known as STG ( Spineless
Tagless G­Machine ) an abstract machine model that makes all laziness explicit. The spineless indicates that function
applications in the language do not have a spine of applications of functions are collapsed into a sequence of arguments.
Currying is still present in the semantics since arity information is stored and partially applied functions will evaluate
differently than saturated functions.

-- Spine
f x y z = App (App (App f x) y) z

-- Spineless
f x y z = App f [x, y, z]

All let statements in STG bind a name to a lambda form. A lambda form with no arguments is a thunk, while a lambda­
form with arguments indicates that a closure is to be allocated that captures the variables explicitly mentioned.
Thunks themselves are either reentrant ( \r ) or updatable ( \u ) indicating that the thunk and either yields a value to
the stack or is allocated on the heap after the update frame is evaluated. All subsequent entries of the thunk will yield
the already­computed value without needing to redo the same work.
A lambda form also indicates the static reference table a collection of references to static heap allocated values referred to
by the body of the function.
For example turning on -ddump-stg we can see the expansion of the following compose function.

-- Frontend
compose f g = \x -> f (g x)

-- Core
compose :: forall t t1 t2. (t1 -> t) -> (t2 -> t1) -> t2 -> t
compose =
\ (@ t) (@ t1) (@ t2) (f :: t1 -> t) (g :: t2 -> t1) (x :: t2) ->
f (g x)

-- STG
compose :: forall t t1 t2. (t1 -> t) -> (t2 -> t1) -> t2 -> t =
\r [f g x] let { sat :: t1 = \u [] g x; } in f sat;
SRT(compose): []

For a more sophisticated example, let’s trace the compilation of the factorial function.
409 GHC

-- Frontend
fac :: Int -> Int -> Int
fac a 0 = a
fac a n = fac (n*a) (n-1)

-- Core
Rec {
fac :: Int -> Int -> Int
fac =
\ (a :: Int) (ds :: Int) ->
case ds of wild { I# ds1 ->
case ds1 of _ {
__DEFAULT ->
fac (* @ Int $fNumInt wild a) (- @ Int $fNumInt wild (I# 1));
0 -> a
}
}
end Rec }

-- STG
fac :: Int -> Int -> Int =
\r srt:(0,*bitmap*) [a ds]
case ds of wild {
I# ds1 ->
case ds1 of _ {
__DEFAULT ->
let {
sat :: Int =
\u srt:(1,*bitmap*) []
let { sat :: Int = NO_CCS I#! [1]; } in - $fNumInt wild sat; } in
let { sat :: Int = \u srt:(1,*bitmap*) [] * $fNumInt wild a;
} in fac sat sat;
0 -> a;
};
};
SRT(fac): [fac, $fNumInt]

Notice that the factorial function allocates two thunks ( look for \u ) inside of the loop which are updated when
computed. It also includes static references to both itself (for recursion) and the dictionary for instance of Num typeclass
over the type Int .

The type system of STG system consists of the following types. The size of these types depend on the size of a void*
pointer on the architecture.

• StgWord ­ An unsigned system integer type of word size

• StgPtr ­ Basic pointer type
• StgBool ­ Boolean int bit flag
• StgInt ­ Int#
• StgChar ­ Char#
• StgFloat ­ Float#
• StgDouble ­ Double#
GHC 410

• StgAddr ­ Addr# ( void * pointer)

• StgStablePtr ­ StablePtr#
• StgOffset ­ Byte offset within a closure
• StgFunPtr ­ Pointer to a C functions
• StgVolatilePtr ­ Pointer to a volatile word

Worker/Wrapper
With -O2 turned on GHC will perform a special optimization known as the Worker­Wrapper transformation which
will split the logic of the factorial function across two definitions, the worker will operate over stack unboxed allocated
machine integers which compiles into a tight inner loop while the wrapper calls into the worker and collects the end
result of the loop and packages it back up into a boxed heap value. This can often be an order of of magnitude faster
than the naive implementation which needs to pack and unpack the boxed integers on every iteration.

-- Worker
$wfac :: Int# -> Int# -> Int# =
\r [ww ww1]
case ww1 of ds {
__DEFAULT ->
case -# [ds 1] of sat {
__DEFAULT ->
case *# [ds ww] of sat { __DEFAULT -> $wfac sat sat; };
};
0 -> ww;
};
SRT($wfac): []

-- Wrapper
fac :: Int -> Int -> Int =
\r [w w1]
case w of _ {
I# ww ->
case w1 of _ {
I# ww1 -> case $wfac ww ww1 of ww2 { __DEFAULT -> I# [ww2]; };
};
};
SRT(fac): []

See:
• Writing Haskell as Fast as C

Z­Encoding
The Z­encoding is Haskell’s convention for generating names that are safely represented in the compiler target language.
Simply put the z­encoding renames many symbolic characters into special sequences of the z character.

String Z­Encoded String

foo foo
z zz
Z ZZ
() Z0T
411 GHC

String Z­Encoded String

(,) Z2T
(,,) Z3T
_ zu
( ZL
) ZR
: ZC
# zh
. zi
(#,#) Z2H
(->) ZLzmzgZR

In this way we don’t have to generate unique unidentifiable names for character rich names and can simply have a
straightforward way to translate them into something unique but identifiable.
So for some example names from GHC generated code:

Z­Encoded String Decoded String

ZCMain_main_closure :Main_main_closure
base_GHCziBase_map_closure base_GHC.Base_map_closure
base_GHCziInt_I32zh_con_info base_GHC.Int_I32#_con_info
ghczmprim_GHCziTuple_Z3T_con_info ghc-prim_GHC.Tuple_(,,)_con_in
ghczmprim_GHCziTypes_ZC_con_info ghc-prim_GHC.Types_:_con_info

Cmm
Cmm is GHC’s complex internal intermediate representation that maps directly onto the generated code for the compiler
target. Cmm code generated from Haskell is CPS­converted, all functions never return a value, they simply call the next
frame in the continuation stack. All evaluation of functions proceed by indirectly jumping to a code object with its
arguments placed on the stack by the caller.
This is drastically different than C’s evaluation model, where are placed on the stack and a function yields a value to the
stack after it returns.
There are several common suffixes you’ll see used in all closures and function names:

Symbol Meaning
0 No argument
p Garbage Collected Pointer
n Word­sized non­pointer
l 64­bit non­pointer (long)
v Void
f Float
d Double
v16 16­byte vector
v32 32­byte vector
v64 64­byte vector

Cmm Registers
GHC 412

There are 10 registers that described in the machine model. Sp is the pointer to top of the stack, SpLim is the pointer
to last element in the stack. Hp is the heap pointer, used for allocation and garbage collection with HpLim the current
heap limit.

The R1 register always holds the active closure, and subsequent registers are arguments passed in registers. Functions
with more than 10 values spill into memory.

• Sp
• SpLim
• Hp
• HpLim
• HpAlloc
• R1
• R2
• R3
• R4
• R5
• R6
• R7
• R8
• R9
• R10

Examples

To understand Cmm it is useful to look at the code generated by the equivalent Haskell and slowly understand the
equivalence and mechanical translation maps one to the other.

There are generally two parts to every Cmm definition, the info table and the entry code. The info table maps directly
StgInfoTable struct and contains various fields related to the type of the closure, its payload, and references. The code
objects are basic blocks of generated code that correspond to the logic of the Haskell function/constructor.

For the simplest example consider a constant static constructor. Simply a function which yields the Unit value. In this
case the function is simply a constructor with no payload, and is statically allocated.

Lets consider a few examples to develop some intuition about the Cmm layout for simple Haskell programs.

Haskell:

unit = ()

Cmm:

[section "data" {
unit_closure:
const ()_static_info;
}]

Consider a static constructor with an argument.

Haskell:
413 GHC

con :: Maybe ()
con = Just ()

Cmm:

[section "data" {
con_closure:
const Just_static_info;
const ()_closure+1;
const 1;
}]

Consider a literal constant. This is a static value.

Haskell:

lit :: Int
lit = 1

Cmm:

[section "data" {
lit_closure:
const I#_static_info;
const 1;
}]

Consider the identity function.

Haskell:

id x = x

Cmm:

[section "data" {
id_closure:
const id_info;
},
id_info()
{ label: id_info
rep:HeapRep static { Fun {arity: 1 fun_type: ArgSpec 5} }
}
ch1:
R1 = R2;
jump stg_ap_0_fast; // [R1]
}]
GHC 414

Consider the constant function.

Haskell:

constant x y = x

Cmm:

[section "data" {
constant_closure:
const constant_info;
},
constant_info()
{ label: constant_info
rep:HeapRep static { Fun {arity: 2 fun_type: ArgSpec 12} }
}
cgT:
R1 = R2;
jump stg_ap_0_fast; // [R1]
}]

Consider a function where application of a function ( of unknown arity ) occurs.

Haskell:

compose f g x = f (g x)

Cmm:

[section "data" {
compose_closure:
const compose_info;
},
compose_info()
{ label: compose_info
rep:HeapRep static { Fun {arity: 3 fun_type: ArgSpec 20} }
}
ch9:
Hp = Hp + 32;
if (Hp > HpLim) goto chd;
I64[Hp - 24] = stg_ap_2_upd_info;
I64[Hp - 8] = R3;
I64[Hp + 0] = R4;
R1 = R2;
R2 = Hp - 24;
jump stg_ap_p_fast; // [R1, R2]
che:
R1 = compose_closure;
jump stg_gc_fun; // [R1, R4, R3, R2]
chd:
415 GHC

HpAlloc = 32;
goto che;
}]

Consider a function which branches using pattern matching:

Haskell:

match :: Either a a -> a

match x = case x of
Left a -> a
Right b -> b

Cmm:

[section "data" {
match_closure:
const match_info;
},
sio_ret()
{ label: sio_info
rep:StackRep []
}
ciL:
_ciM::I64 = R1 & 7;
if (_ciM::I64 >= 2) goto ciN;
R1 = I64[R1 + 7];
Sp = Sp + 8;
jump stg_ap_0_fast; // [R1]
ciN:
R1 = I64[R1 + 6];
Sp = Sp + 8;
jump stg_ap_0_fast; // [R1]
},
match_info()
{ label: match_info
rep:HeapRep static { Fun {arity: 1 fun_type: ArgSpec 5} }
}
ciP:
if (Sp - 8 < SpLim) goto ciR;
R1 = R2;
I64[Sp - 8] = sio_info;
Sp = Sp - 8;
if (R1 & 7 != 0) goto ciU;
jump I64[R1]; // [R1]
ciR:
R1 = match_closure;
jump stg_gc_fun; // [R1, R2]
ciU: jump sio_info; // [R1]
}]
GHC 416

Macros
Cmm itself uses many macros to stand for various constructs, many of which are defined in an external C header file. A
short reference for the common types:

Cmm Description
C_ char
D_ double
F_ float
W_ word
P_ garbage collected pointer
I_ int
L_ long
FN_ function pointer (no arguments)
EF_ extern function pointer
I8 8­bit integer
I16 16­bit integer
I32 32­bit integer
I64 64­bit integer

Inside of Cmm logic there are several functions which are commonly invoked:
• Sp_adj ­ Adjusts the stack pointer.
• GET_ENTRY ­
• ENTER ­
• jump ­

stg_init_finish
{
jump StgReturn;
}

stg_init
{
W_ next;
Sp = W_[BaseReg + OFFSET_StgRegTable_rSp];
next = W_[Sp];
Sp_adj(1);
jump next;
}

#define SIZEOF_W 8 /* or 4 depending on platform */

#define WDS(n) ((n)*SIZEOF_W)
#define Sp(n) W_[Sp + WDS(n)]
#define Hp(n) W_[Hp + WDS(n)]
#define Sp_adj(n) Sp = Sp + WDS(n)
#define Hp_adj(n) Hp = Hp + WDS(n)

Many of the predefined closures ( stg_ap_p_fast , etc) are themselves mechanically generated and more or less share
the same form ( a giant switch statement on closure type, update frame, stack adjustment). Inside of GHC is a file named
417 GHC

GenApply.hs that generates most of these functions. For example the output for stg_ap_p_fast .

stg_ap_p_fast
{ W_ info;
W_ arity;
if (GETTAG(R1)==1) {
Sp_adj(0);
jump %GET_ENTRY(R1-1) [R1,R2];
}
if (Sp - WDS(2) < SpLim) {
Sp_adj(-2);
W_[Sp+WDS(1)] = R2;
Sp(0) = stg_ap_p_info;
jump __stg_gc_enter_1 [R1];
}
R1 = UNTAG(R1);
info = %GET_STD_INFO(R1);
switch [INVALID_OBJECT .. N_CLOSURE_TYPES] (TO_W_(%INFO_TYPE(info))) {
case FUN,
FUN_1_0,
FUN_0_1,
FUN_2_0,
FUN_1_1,
FUN_0_2,
FUN_STATIC: {
arity = TO_W_(StgFunInfoExtra_arity(%GET_FUN_INFO(R1)));
ASSERT(arity > 0);
if (arity == 1) {
Sp_adj(0);
R1 = R1 + 1;
jump %GET_ENTRY(UNTAG(R1)) [R1,R2];
} else {
Sp_adj(-2);
W_[Sp+WDS(1)] = R2;
if (arity < 8) {
R1 = R1 + arity;
}
BUILD_PAP(1,1,stg_ap_p_info,FUN);
}
}
default: {
Sp_adj(-2);
W_[Sp+WDS(1)] = R2;
jump RET_LBL(stg_ap_p) [];
}
}
}

Inline CMM
Handwritten Cmm can be included in a module manually by first compiling it through GHC into an object and then
using a special FFI invocation.
GHC 418

#include "Cmm.h"

factorial {
entry:
W_ n ;
W_ acc;
n = R1 ;
acc = n ;
n = n - 1 ;

for:
if (n <= 0 ) {
return(acc);
} else {
acc = acc * n ;
n = n - 1 ;
goto for ;
}
return(0);
}

-- ghc -c factorial.cmm -o factorial.o

-- ghc factorial.o Example.hs -o Example

{-# LANGUAGE MagicHash #-}

{-# LANGUAGE UnliftedFFITypes #-}
{-# LANGUAGE GHCForeignImportPrim #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ForeignFunctionInterface #-}

module Main where

import GHC.Prim
import GHC.Word

foreign import prim "factorial" factorial_cmm :: Word# -> Word#

factorial :: Word64 -> Word64

factorial (W64# n) = W64# (factorial_cmm n)

main :: IO ()
main = print (factorial 5)

Optimisation
GHC uses a suite of assembly optimisations to generate more optimal code.

Tables Next to Code

GHC will place the info table for a toplevel closure directly next to the entry­code for the objects in memory such that the
fields from the info table can be accessed by pointer arithmetic on the function pointer to the code itself. Not performing
419 GHC

this optimization would involve chasing through one more pointer to get to the info table. Given how often info­tables
are accessed using the tables­next­to­code optimization results in a tractable speedup.

Pointer Tagging
Depending on the type of the closure involved, GHC will utilize the last few bits in a pointer to the closure to store
information that can be read off from the bits of pointer itself before jumping into or access the info tables. For thunks
this can be information like whether it is evaluated to WHNF or not, for constructors it contains the constructor tag (if
it fits) to avoid an info table lookup.
Depending on the architecture the tag bits are either the last 2 or 3 bits of a pointer.

// 32 bit arch
TAG_BITS = 2

// 64-bit arch
TAG_BITS = 3

These occur in Cmm most frequently via the following macro definitions:

#define TAG_MASK ((1 << TAG_BITS) - 1)

#define UNTAG(p) (p & ~TAG_MASK)
#define GETTAG(p) (p & TAG_MASK)

So for instance in many of the precompiled functions, there will be a test for whether the active closure R1 is already
evaluated.

if (GETTAG(R1)==1) {
Sp_adj(0);
jump %GET_ENTRY(R1-1) [R1,R2];
}

Interface Files
During compilation GHC will produce interface files for each module that are the binary encoding of specific symbols
(functions, typeclasses, etc) exported by that module as well as any package dependencies it itself depends on. This is
effectively the serialized form of the ModGuts structure used internally in the compiler. The internal structure of this file
can be dumped using the --show-iface flag. The precise structure changes between versions of GHC.

$ ghc --show-iface let.hi

Magic: Wanted 33214052,
got 33214052
Version: Wanted [7, 0, 8, 4],
got [7, 0, 8, 4]
Way: Wanted [],
got []
interface main:Main 7084
interface hash: 1991c3e0edf3e849aeb53783fb616df2
ABI hash: 0b7173fb01d2226a2e61df72371034ee
export-list hash: 0f26147773230f50ea3b06fe20c9c66c
orphan hash: 693e9af84d3dfcc71e640e005bdc5e2e
GHC 420

flag hash: 9b3dfba8e3209c5b5c132a214b6b9bd3

used TH splices: False
where
exports:
Main.main
module dependencies:
package dependencies: base* ghc-prim integer-gmp
orphans: base:GHC.Base base:GHC.Float base:GHC.Real
family instance modules: base:Data.Either base:Data.Monoid
base:Data.Type.Equality base:GHC.Generics
import -/ base:GHC.Num 5e7786970581cacc802bf850d458a30b
import -/ base:Prelude 74043f272d60acec1777d3461cfe5ef4
import -/ base:System.IO cadd0efb01c47ddd8f52d750739fdbdf
import -/ ghc-prim:GHC.Types dcba736fa3dfba12d307ab18354845d2
4cfa03293a8356d627c0c5fec26936e2
main :: GHC.Types.IO ()
vectorised variables:
vectorised tycons:
vectorised reused tycons:
parallel variables:
parallel tycons:
trusted: safe-inferred
require own pkg trusted: False

Runtime System
The GHC runtime system is a massive part of the compiler. It comes in at around 70,000 lines of C and Cmm. There
is simply no way to explain most of what occurs in the runtime succinctly. There is more than three decades worth of
work that has gone into making this system and it is quite advanced. Instead lets look at the basic structure and some
core modules.
The golden source of truth for all GHC internals is the GHC Wiki Commentary written by the compiler maintainers:
https://gitlab.haskell.org/ghc/ghc/wikis/commentary
Inside the GHC source tree the runtime system spans multiple modules. The bulk of the runtime logic is stored across
the includes , utils and rts folders.

ghc-8.8.2
├── compiler
│   └── prelude
│ └── primops.txt.pp # Definitions of primops
├── compiler
├── includes
│   ├── rts # Public interface for RTS
│   └── stg # Definitions for STG langauge
├── utils
│   ├── genapply # Generates Cmm closure application boilerplate
│   ├── genprimopcode # Generates Primop builtin operations for GHC
│   └── deriveConstants # Machine specific information about register and sizes
└── rts
   ├── hooks
421 GHC

   ├── linker
   ├── posix
   ├── sm
   └── win32

The toplevel for the runtime interface is exposed through six key header files found in the /includes folder.

includes
├── Cmm.h # Defines Cmm types and macros
├── HsFFI.h # Defines mapping between STG types and Haskell types, and FFI functions
├── MachDeps.h # Defines types of of machine integer types and sizes
├── Rts.h # Declares everything that the GHC RTS exposes externally
├── RtsAPI.h # API for invoking Haskell functions via the RTS
└── STG.h # Toplevel import for all STG types, control flow operations and memory layout

The stg folder contains many of the macros used in the evaluation of STG as well as the memory layout and mappings
from to STG to machine types.

include/stg
├── DLL.h # Support for Windows DLLs
├── HaskellMachRegs.h # Registers used in STG code
├── MachRegs.h # Registers used in STG code
├── MiscClosures.h # Type definitions for layout of STG closures
├── Prim.h # Declarations of primops
├── Regs.h # Registers for STG virtual machine
├── RtsMachRegs.h # Registers for STG virtual machine
├── SMP.h # Declarations for multicore memory operations
├── Ticky.h # Profiling tools
└── Types.h # C Declarations of types used in STG

The storage folder contains format definitions define that define the memory layout of closures, InfoTables, sparks,
etc as they are represented on the heap.

include/rts/storage
├── Block.h # Block structure for the storage manager
├── ClosureMacros.h # Macros for manipulating info tables of closures
├── Closures.h # Type definitions for closures
├── ClosureTypes.h # Definitions for closure metadata (arity, etc)
├── FunTypes.h # Definitions of function argument types
├── GC.h # Type definitions for GC blocks, nursery, generations
├── Heap.h # Introsepction for GHC heap
├── InfoTables.h # Type definitinos for function info tables
├── MBlock.h # Introspection for determining if points are on the GHC heap
└── TSO.h # Thread state objects

Inside the utils folder of the GHC source tree are several utilities that generate Cmm modules that GHC is compiled
against. These are boilerplate modules that define the Cmm macros in terms of the Haskell datatypes defined in the
Stg definitions in the compiler.

• genprimop ­ Generate the builtin primop definitions.

• genapply ­ Generate the entry logic for manipulating the stack when entering functions of various arities.
GHC 422

• deriveConstants ­ Generates the header files containing constant values (pointer size, word sizes, etc) of the target
platform
For genprimop , the primops are generated from a custom domain specific langauge specified in primops.txt.pp
which defines the primops, their arity, commutative and associvaity properties and the machine types they operate over.
An example for integer addition for ( +# ) looks like:

primtype Int#

primop IntAddOp "+#" Dyadic

Int# -> Int# -> Int#
with commutable = True
fixity = infixl 6

primop IntSubOp "-#" Dyadic Int# -> Int# -> Int#

with fixity = infixl 6

For genapply this generates all the Cmm definitions in Apply.cmm for manipulating the stack when evaluating a clo­
sure. For example a function of arity 2 ( ap ) is applied to 2 pointer arguments ( pp ) we would jump to stg_ap_stk_pp
definition.

stg_ap_stk_pp
{ R3 = W_[Sp+WDS(1)];
R2 = W_[Sp+WDS(0)];
Sp_adj(2);
jump %GET_ENTRY(UNTAG(R1)) [R1,R2,R3];
}

The conventions for these single letters is described by the following datatype in Main.hs of genapply :

data ArgRep
= N -- non-ptr
| P -- ptr
| V -- void
| F -- float
| D -- double
| L -- long (64-bit)
| V16 -- 16-byte (128-bit) vectors
| V32 -- 32-byte (256-bit) vectors
| V64 -- 64-byte (512-bit) vectors

The include/rts folder itself contains all the public header files for all aspects of the runtime. Most of thes are included
in Rts.h toplevel import.

include/rts
├── Adjustor.h # Dynamically allocated code for Haskell closures to be viewed as C function pointers
├── BlockSignals.h # RTS signal handling
├── Bytecodes.h # Bytecode definitions for GHCi
├── Config.h # Runtime system settings (debug, profiling)
├── Constants.h # Global constants
├── EventLogFormat.h # Event log for profiling
├── EventLogWriter.h # Event log for profiling
423 GHC

├── FileLock.h # Filesystem file locking

├── Flags.h # +RTS flag settings
├── GetTime.h # System clock timers
├── Globals.h # Data.Typeale and GHC.Conc storage utilities
├── Hpc.h # Haskell program coverage hooks
├── IOManager.h # IO event loop
├── Libdw.h # DWARF debugging
├── LibdwPool.h # DWARF debugging
├── Linker.h # Object linker
├── Main.h # Defines hs_main entry point invoked by Main.main
├── Messages.h # Runtime error logging
├── OSThreads.h # Abstraction over operating system thread libraries
├── Parallel.h # Defines newSpark primitive
├── PrimFloat.h # Primitive floating point operations
├── Profiling.h # Cost center profiling
├── Signals.h # RTS signal handling
├── SpinLock.h # Abstraction over system spin locks
├── StableName.h # Interface for GHC.StableName objects
├── StablePtr.h # Interface for GHC.Stable pointers which arent collected by GC
├── StaticPtrTable.h # Declarations for Static Pointer Table
├── Threads.h # Interface for thread scheduler
├── Ticky.h # Profiling counter types
├── Time.h # Time resolution and datatype settings for the runtime
├── Timer.h # Timer for profiling
├── TTY.h # POSIX tty interface
├── Types.h # RTS types, defines StgClosure StgInfoTable and StgTSO
└── Utils.h # Misc utilities

The runtime system folder itself contains several modules which are written in Cmm.

rts
├── Apply.cmm # Application of closures
├── Compact.cmm # Compact regions
├── Exception.cmm # Async exception primitives
├── HeapStackCheck.cmm # Heap and Stack failure checks
├── PrimOps.cmm # Array, MVar, TVar, STM primitives
├── StgMiscClosures.cmm # Entry code for closure types
├── StgStartup.cmm # Code for starting, stopping and restarting threads
├── StgStdThunks.cmm # Introspection and field selection of thunks
└── Updates.cmm # Code up to update thunks, BlackHole handling.

The core library for the garbage collector used in the runtime is stored in the sm subfolder of rts and contains several
implementations of the garbage collectors that Haskell programs can be compiled with.

rts/sm
├── BlockAlloc.c # GC block allocator
├── CNF.c # Compact normal forms, non-GCd structures
├── Compact.c # Compacting garbage collector
├── Evac.c # Generational garbage collector:
├── GC.c # Generational garbage collector
├── MBlock.c # Architecture-dependent functions for allocations
├── NonMoving.c # Low-latency garbage collector
GHC 424

├── NonMovingMark.c # Low-latency garbage collector mark algorithm

├── Sanity.c # Sanity checking for heap and stack
├── Scav.c # Scavenger functions for generational GC
├── Storage.c # GC storage manager
└── Sweep.c # Mark and sweep algorithm for block allocator

The source for the whole runtime in rts contains 50 or so modules. The core units of logic are described briefly below.

rts
├── Arena.c # Arena datatypes for garbage collector
├── ClosureFlags.c # Definitions for types of closures
├── Disassembler.c # Bytecode interpreter for GHCi
├── Globals.c # Runtime system global variables
├── Hash.c # GHCs hash table implementation
├── Heap.c # GHC heap definition
├── HsFFI.c # Foreign function interface
├── Interpreter.c # Bytecode interpreter for GHCi
├── Linker.c # Object code linker
├── Printer.c # Heap value pretty printer
├── Profiling.c # Entry point for profiling functions
├── RtsAPI.c # API for invoking Haskell functions via the RTS
├── RtsMain.c # Entry point for runtime system
├── RtsStartup.c # Main function for a standalone Haskell program.
├── RtsSymbolInfo.c # RTS symbol table handling
├── RtsSymbols.c # RTS symbol definitions
├── Schedule.c # Thread scheduler
├── Sparks.c # Spark pools for parallel runtime
├── StgCRun.c # Entry point for running STG functions from C
├── STM.c # Software transactional memory
├── Task.c # Task managerw for parallel runtime
├── Threads.c # Core thread types and spawning functions
├── TopHandler.c # RTS main thread handler
├── Weak.c # Handling of weak pointers and finalisation logic
└── WSDeque.c # Work-stealing deque data structure for parallel runtime

The runtime system itself also has three different modes/ways of operation.
• Vanilla ­ Runtime without additional settings. Single threaded.
• Threaded ­ Runtime linked using the -threaded option.
• Profiling ­ Runtime linked using the -prof option.

The specific flags can be checked by passing +RTS --info to a compiled binary.

[("GHC RTS", "YES")

,("GHC version", "8.6.5")
,("RTS way", "rts_v")
,("Build platform", "x86_64-unknown-linux")
,("Build architecture", "x86_64")
,("Build OS", "linux")
,("Build vendor", "unknown")
,("Host platform", "x86_64-unknown-linux")
,("Host architecture", "x86_64")
425 GHC

,("Host OS", "linux")

,("Host vendor", "unknown")
,("Target platform", "x86_64-unknown-linux")
,("Target architecture", "x86_64")
,("Target OS", "linux")
,("Target vendor", "unknown")
,("Word size", "64")
,("Compiler unregisterised", "NO")
,("Tables next to code", "YES")
]

The state of the runtime can also be queried at runtime for statistics about the heap, garbage collector and wall time. The
getRTSStats generates two datatypes with all the queryable information contained in RTSStats and GCDetails .

import GHC.Stats
getRTSStats :: IO RTSStats
GHC 426
Chapter 31

Profiling

Criterion
Criterion is a statistically aware benchmarking tool. It exposes a library which allows us to benchmark individual func­
tions over and over and test the distribution of timings for aberrant beahvior and stability. These kind of tests are quite
common to include in libraries which need to test that the introduction of new logic doesn’t result in performance
regressions.
Criterion operates largely with the following four functions.

whnf :: (a -> b) -> a -> Pure

nf :: NFData b => (a -> b) -> a -> Pure
nfIO :: NFData a => IO a -> IO ()
bench :: Benchmarkable b => String -> b -> Benchmark

The whnf function evaluates a function applied to an argument a to weak head normal form, while nf evaluates a
function applied to an argument a deeply to normal form. See Laziness.
The bench function samples a function over and over according to a configuration to develop a statistical distribution
of its runtime.

import Criterion.Main

-- Naive recursion for fibonacci numbers.

fib1 :: Int -> Int
fib1 0 = 0
fib1 1 = 1
fib1 n = fib1 (n -1) + fib1 (n -2)

-- Use the De Moivre closed form for fibonacci numbers.

fib2 :: Int -> Int
fib2 x = truncate $ (1 / sqrt 5) * (phi ^ x - psi ^ x)
where
phi = (1 + sqrt 5) / 2
psi = (1 - sqrt 5) / 2

suite :: [Benchmark]
suite =

427
PROFILING 428

[ bgroup
"naive"
[ bench "fib 10" $ whnf fib1 5,
bench "fib 20" $ whnf fib1 10
],
bgroup
"de moivre"
[ bench "fib 10" $ whnf fib2 5,
bench "fib 20" $ whnf fib2 10
]
]

main :: IO ()
main = defaultMain suite

These criterion reports can be generated out to either CSV or to an HTML file output with plots of the data.

$ runhaskell criterion.hs
warming up
estimating clock resolution...
mean is 2.349801 us (320001 iterations)
found 1788 outliers among 319999 samples (0.6%)
1373 (0.4%) high severe
estimating cost of a clock call...
mean is 65.52118 ns (23 iterations)
found 1 outliers among 23 samples (4.3%)
1 (4.3%) high severe

benchmarking de moivre/fib 20
mean: 8.082639 us, lb 8.018560 us, ub 8.350159 us, ci 0.950
std dev: 595.2161 ns, lb 77.46251 ns, ub 1.408784 us, ci 0.950
found 8 outliers among 100 samples (8.0%)
4 (4.0%) high mild
4 (4.0%) high severe
variance introduced by outliers: 67.628%
variance is severely inflated by outliers

To generate an HTML page containing the benchmark results plotted

$ ghc -O2 --make criterion.hs

$ ./criterion -o bench.html
429 PROFILING

EKG
EKG is a monitoring tool that can monitor various aspect of GHC’s runtime alongside an active process. The interface
for the output is viewable within a browser interface. The monitoring process is forked off (in a system thread) from the
main process.

{-# Language OverloadedStrings #-}

import Control.Monad
import System.Remote.Monitoring

main :: IO ()
main = do
ekg <- forkServer "localhost" 8000
putStrLn "Started server on http://localhost:8000"
forever $ getLine >>= putStrLn

RTS Profiling
The GHC runtime system can be asked to dump information about allocations and percentage of wall time spent in
various portions of the runtime system.

$ ./program +RTS -s

1,939,784 bytes allocated in the heap

11,160 bytes copied during GC
44,416 bytes maximum residency (2 sample(s))
21,120 bytes maximum slop
1 MB total memory in use (0 MB lost due to fragmentation)

Tot time (elapsed) Avg pause Max pause

Gen 0 2 colls, 0 par 0.00s 0.00s 0.0000s 0.0000s
PROFILING 430

Gen 1 2 colls, 0 par 0.00s 0.00s 0.0002s 0.0003s

INIT time 0.00s ( 0.00s elapsed)

MUT time 0.00s ( 0.01s elapsed)
GC time 0.00s ( 0.00s elapsed)
EXIT time 0.00s ( 0.00s elapsed)
Total time 0.01s ( 0.01s elapsed)

%GC time 5.0% (7.1% elapsed)

Alloc rate 398,112,898 bytes per MUT second

Productivity 91.4% of total user, 128.8% of total elapsed

Productivity indicates the amount of time spent during execution compared to the time spent garbage collecting. Well
tuned CPU bound programs are often in the 90­99% range of productivity range.
In addition individual function profiling information can be generated by compiling the program with -prof flag. The
resulting information is outputted to a .prof file of the same name as the module. This is useful for tracking down
hotspots in the program.

$ ghc -O2 program.hs -prof -auto-all

$ ./program +RTS -p
$ cat program.prof
Mon Oct 27 23:00 2014 Time and Allocation Profiling Report (Final)

program +RTS -p -RTS

total time = 0.01 secs (7 ticks @ 1000 us, 1 processor)

total alloc = 1,937,336 bytes (excludes profiling overheads)

COST CENTRE MODULE %time %alloc

CAF Main 100.0 97.2

CAF GHC.IO.Handle.FD 0.0 1.8

individual inherited
COST CENTRE MODULE no. entries %time %alloc %time %alloc

MAIN MAIN 42 0 0.0 0.7 100.0 100.0

CAF Main 83 0 100.0 97.2 100.0 97.2
CAF GHC.IO.Encoding 78 0 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.1
CAF GHC.IO.Handle.FD 77 0 0.0 1.8 0.0 1.8
CAF GHC.Conc.Signal 74 0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
CAF GHC.IO.Encoding.Iconv 69 0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
CAF GHC.Show 60 0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Chapter 32

Compilers

Haskell is widely regarded as being a best in class for the construction of compilers and there are many examples of
programming languages that were bootstrapped on Haskell.
Compiler development largely consists of a process of transforming one graph representation of a program or abstract
syntax tree into simpler graph representations while preserving the semantics of the languages. Many of these operations
can be written quite concisely using Haskell’s pattern matching machinery.
Haskell itself also has a rich academic tradition and an enormous number of academic papers will use Haskell as the
implementation language used to describe a typechecker, parser or other novel compiler idea.
In addition the Hackage ecosystem has a wide variety of modules that many individuals have abstracted out of their own
compilers into reusable components. These are broadly divided into several categories:
• Binder libraries ­ Libraries for manipulating lambda calculus terms and perform capture­avoiding substitution,
alpha renaming and beta reduction.
• Name generation ­ Generation of fresh names for use in compiler passes which need to generates names which
don’t clash with each other.
• Code Generators ­ Libraries for emitting LLVM or other assembly representations at the end of the compiler.
• Source Generators ­ Libraries for emitting textual syntax of another language used for doing source­to­source
translations.
• Graph Analysis ­ Libraries for doing control flow analysis.
• Pretty Printers ­ Libraries for turning abstract syntax trees into textual forms.
• Parser Generators ­ Libraries for generating parsers and lexers from higher­level syntax descriptions.
• Traversal Utilities ­ Libraries for writing traversal and rewrite systems across AST types.
• REPL Generators ­ Libraries fo building command line interfaces for Read­Eval­Print loops.

Unbound
Several libraries exist to mechanize the process of writing name capture and substitution, since it is largely mechanical.
Probably the most robust is the unbound library. For example we can implement the infer function for a small Hindley­
Milner system over a simple typed lambda calculus without having to write the name capture and substitution mechanics
ourselves.

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

431
COMPILERS 432

module Infer where

import Data.String
import Data.Map (Map)
import Control.Monad.Error
import qualified Data.Map as Map

import qualified Unbound.LocallyNameless as NL

import Unbound.LocallyNameless hiding (Subst, compose)

data Type
= TVar (Name Type)
| TArr Type Type
deriving (Show)

data Expr
= Var (Name Expr)
| Lam (Bind (Name Expr) Expr)
| App Expr Expr
| Let (Bind (Name Expr) Expr)
deriving (Show)

$(derive [''Type, ''Expr])

instance IsString Expr where

fromString = Var . fromString
instance IsString Type where
fromString = TVar . fromString
instance IsString (Name Expr) where
fromString = string2Name
instance IsString (Name Type) where
fromString = string2Name

instance Eq Type where

(==) = eqType

eqType :: Type -> Type -> Bool

eqType (TVar v1) (TVar v2) = v1 == v2
eqType _ _ = False

uvar :: String -> Expr

uvar x = Var (s2n x)

tvar :: String -> Type

tvar x = TVar (s2n x)

instance Alpha Type

instance Alpha Expr

instance NL.Subst Type Type where

isvar (TVar v) = Just (SubstName v)
433 COMPILERS

isvar _ = Nothing

instance NL.Subst Expr Expr where

isvar (Var v) = Just (SubstName v)
isvar _ = Nothing

instance NL.Subst Expr Type where

data TypeError
= UnboundVariable (Name Expr)
| GenericTypeError
deriving (Show)

instance Error TypeError where

noMsg = GenericTypeError

type Env = Map (Name Expr) Type

type Constraint = (Type, Type)
type Infer = ErrorT TypeError FreshM

empty :: Env
empty = Map.empty

freshtv :: Infer Type

freshtv = do
x <- fresh "_t"
return $ TVar x

infer :: Env -> Expr -> Infer (Type, [Constraint])

infer env expr = case expr of

Lam b -> do
(n,e) <- unbind b
tv <- freshtv
let env' = Map.insert n tv env
(t, cs) <- infer env' e
return (TArr tv t, cs)

App e1 e2 -> do
(t1, cs1) <- infer env e1
(t2, cs2) <- infer env e2
tv <- freshtv
return (tv, (t1, TArr t2 tv) : cs1 ++ cs2)

Var n -> do
case Map.lookup n env of
Nothing -> throwError $ UnboundVariable n
Just t -> return (t, [])

Let b -> do
(n, e) <- unbind b
COMPILERS 434

(tBody, csBody) <- infer env e

let env' = Map.insert n tBody env
(t, cs) <- infer env' e
return (t, cs ++ csBody)

Unbound Generics
Recently unbound was ported to use GHC.Generics instead of Template Haskell. The API is effectively the same, so for
example a simple lambda calculus could be written as:

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveGeneric #-}

{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}
{-# LANGUAGE ScopedTypeVariables #-}

module LC where

import Unbound.Generics.LocallyNameless
import Unbound.Generics.LocallyNameless.Internal.Fold (toListOf)

import GHC.Generics

import Data.Typeable (Typeable)

import Data.Set as S

import Control.Monad.Reader (Reader, runReader)

data Exp
= Var (Name Exp)
| Lam (Bind (Name Exp) Exp)
| App Exp Exp
deriving (Show, Generic, Typeable)

instance Alpha Exp

instance Subst Exp Exp where

isvar (Var x) = Just (SubstName x)
isvar _ = Nothing

fvSet :: (Alpha a, Typeable b) => a -> S.Set (Name b)

fvSet = S.fromList . toListOf fv

type M a = FreshM a

(=~) :: Exp -> Exp -> M Bool

e1 =~ e2 | e1 `aeq` e2 = return True
e1 =~ e2 = do
e1' <- red e1
e2' <- red e2
435 COMPILERS

if e1' `aeq` e1 && e2' `aeq` e2

then return False
else e1' =~ e2'

-- Reduction
red :: Exp -> M Exp
red (App e1 e2) = do
e1' <- red e1
e2' <- red e2
case e1' of
Lam bnd -> do
(x, e1'') <- unbind bnd
return $ subst x e2' e1''
otherwise -> return $ App e1' e2'
red (Lam bnd) = do
(x, e) <- unbind bnd
e' <- red e
case e of
App e1 (Var y) | y == x && x `S.notMember` fvSet e1 -> return e1
otherwise -> return (Lam (bind x e'))
red (Var x) = return $ (Var x)

x :: Name Exp
x = string2Name "x"

y :: Name Exp
y = string2Name "y"

z :: Name Exp
z = string2Name "z"

s :: Name Exp
s = string2Name "s"

lam :: Name Exp -> Exp -> Exp

lam x y = Lam (bind x y)

zero = lam s (lam z (Var z))

one = lam s (lam z (App (Var s) (Var z)))
two = lam s (lam z (App (Var s) (App (Var s) (Var z))))
three = lam s (lam z (App (Var s) (App (Var s) (App (Var s) (Var z)))))

plus = lam x (lam y (lam s (lam z (App (App (Var x) (Var s)) (App (App (Var y) (Var s)) (Var z))))))

true = lam x (lam y (Var x))

false = lam x (lam y (Var y))
if_ x y z = (App (App x y) z)

main :: IO ()
main = do
print $ lam x (Var x) `aeq` lam y (Var y)
print $ not (lam x (Var y) `aeq` lam x (Var x))
COMPILERS 436

print $ lam x (App (lam y (Var x)) (lam y (Var y))) =~ (lam y (Var y))
print $ lam x (App (Var y) (Var x)) =~ Var y
print $ if_ true (Var x) (Var y) =~ Var x
print $ if_ false (Var x) (Var y) =~ Var y
print $ App (App plus one) two =~ three

See:
• unbound­generics

Pretty Printers
Pretty is the first Wadler­Leijen style combinator library, it exposes a simple set of primitives to print Haskell datatypes to
legacy strings programmatically. You probably don’t want to use this library but it inspired most of the ones that followed
after. There are many many many pretty printing libraries for Haskell.
Wadler­Leijen Style
• pretty
• wl­pprint
• wl­pprint­text
• wl­pprint­ansiterm
• wl­pprint­terminfo
• wl­pprint­annotated
• wl­pprint­console
• ansi­pretty
• ansi­terminal
• ansi­wl­pprint
Modern
• prettyprinter
• prettyprinter­ansi­terminal
• prettyprinter­compat­annotated­wl­pprint
• prettyprinter­compat­ansi­wl­pprint
• prettyprinter­compat­wl­pprint
• prettyprinter­convert­ansi­wl­pprint
Specialised
• layout
• aeson­pretty
These days it is best to avoid the pretty printer and use the standard prettyprinter library which subsumes most of
the features of these previous libraries under one modern uniform API.

prettyprinter
Pretty printer is a printer combinator library which allows us to write typeclasses over datatypes to render them to strings
with arbitrary formatting. These kind of libraries show up everywhere where the default Show instance is insufficient
for rendering.
The base interface to these libraries is exposed as a Pretty class which monoidally composes a variety of documents
together. The Monoid append operation simply concatenates two documents while a variety of higher level combinators
add additional string elements into the language.
437 COMPILERS

The Pretty class maps an arbitrary value into a Doc type which is annotated with the renderer.

data Doc ann

class Pretty a where

pretty :: a -> Doc ann
prettyList :: [a] -> Doc ann

The Doc type can then be rendered to any number of strings type means of a layout algorithm. The builtin methods
are Compact , Smart and Pretty .

viaShow :: Show a => a -> Doc ann

layoutPretty :: LayoutOptions -> Doc ann -> SimpleDocStream ann
renderStrict :: SimpleDocStream ann -> Text
putDoc :: Doc ann -> IO ()

The common combinators are shown below,

Combinator Description
<> Concatenation
<+> Spaced concatenation
nest Nested a document with whitespace
group Lays out on a line by removing line breaks
align Lays out with the nesting level at the current column
hang Lays out with the nesting level relative to the first line
indent Increases indentation by a given count
list Lays out a given list with braces and commas.
tupled Lays out a given list with parens and commas.
hsep Concatenates list of docs horizontally with a separator
hcat Concatenates list of docs horizontally
vcat Concatenates list of docs vertically
puncutate Appends a given doc to all elements of a list of docs
parens Surrounds with parentheses
dquotes Surrounds with double quotes

For example the common pretty printed form of the lambda calculus k combinator is:

\f g x . (f (g x))

The prettyprinter library can be used to pretty print nested data structures in a more human readable form for any type
that implements Show . For example a dump of the structure for the AST of SK combinator with ppShow .

App
(Lam
"f" (Lam "g" (Lam "x" (App (Var "f") (App (Var "g") (Var "x"))))))
(Lam "x" (Lam "y" (Var "x")))

A full example of pretty printing the lambda calculus is shown below. This uses a custom Pretty class to pass an
integral value which indicates the depth of the lambda expression. Alternatively the builtin Pretty class could be used
for simpler datatypes.
COMPILERS 438

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}

import Data.Text.Prettyprint.Doc hiding (Pretty)

import Data.Text.Prettyprint.Doc.Render.Terminal

parensIf :: Bool -> Doc a -> Doc a

parensIf True = parens
parensIf False = id

type Name = String

data Expr
= Var String
| Lit Ground
| App Expr Expr
| Lam Name Expr
deriving (Eq, Show)

data Ground
= LInt Int
| LBool Bool
deriving (Show, Eq, Ord)

class Pretty p where

ppr :: Int -> p -> Doc AnsiStyle

instance Pretty String where

ppr _ = pretty

instance Pretty (Doc AnsiStyle) where

ppr _ = id

instance Pretty Expr where

ppr _ (Var x) = pretty x
ppr _ (Lit (LInt a)) = pretty (show a)
ppr _ (Lit (LBool b)) = pretty (show b)
ppr p e@(App _ _) =
let (f, xs) = viewApp e
in let args = sep $ map (ppr (p + 1)) xs
in parensIf (p > 0) $ ppr p f <+> args
ppr p e@(Lam _ _) =
let body = ppr (p + 1) (viewBody e)
in let vars = map (ppr 0) (viewVars e)
in parensIf (p > 0) $ pretty '\\' <> hsep vars <+> pretty "." <+> body

viewVars :: Expr -> [Name]

viewVars (Lam n a) = n : viewVars a
viewVars _ = []

viewBody :: Expr -> Expr

viewBody (Lam _ a) = viewBody a
viewBody x = x
439 COMPILERS

viewApp :: Expr -> (Expr, [Expr])

viewApp (App e1 e2) = go e1 [e2]
where
go (App a b) xs = go a (b : xs)
go f xs = (f, xs)

ppexpr :: Expr -> IO ()

ppexpr = render . ppr 0

render :: Pretty a => a -> IO ()

render a = putDoc (ppr 0 a)

s , k, example :: Expr
s = Lam "f" (Lam "g" (Lam "x" (App (Var "f") (App (Var "g") (Var "x")))))
k = Lam "x" (Lam "y" (Var "x"))
example = App s k

main :: IO ()
main = render s

pretty­simple
pretty­simple is a Haskell library that renders Show instances in a prettier way. It exposes functions which are drop in
replacements for show and print.

pPrint :: (MonadIO m, Show a) => a -> m ()

pShow :: Show a => a -> Text
pPrintNoColor :: (MonadIO m, Show a) => a -> m ()

A simple example is shown below.

import Text.Pretty.Simple

main :: IO ()
main = do
pPrint [1 .. 25]
pPrint [Just (1, "hello")]

Pretty­simple can be used as the default GHCi printer as shown in the .ghci.conf section.

Haskeline
Haskeline is a Haskell library exposing cross­platform readline. It provides a monad which can take user input from the
command line and allow the user to edit and go back forth on a line of input as well simple tab completion.

data InputT m a

runInputT :: Settings IO -> InputT IO a -> IO a

COMPILERS 440

getInputLine :: String -> InputT IO (Maybe String)

outputStrLn :: MonadIO m => String -> InputT m ()

A simple example of usage is shown below:

import Control.Monad.Trans
import System.Console.Haskeline

type Repl a = InputT IO a

process :: String -> IO ()

process = putStrLn

repl :: Repl ()
repl = do
minput <- getInputLine "Repl> "
case minput of
Nothing -> outputStrLn "Goodbye."
Just input -> (liftIO $ process input) >> repl

main :: IO ()
main = runInputT defaultSettings repl

Repline
Certain sets of tasks in building command line REPL interfaces are so common that is becomes useful to abstract them
out into a library. While haskeline provides a sensible lower­level API for interfacing with GNU readline, it is somewhat
tedious to implement tab completion logic and common command logic over and over. To that end Repline assists in
building interactive shells that that resemble GHCi’s default behavior.

module Main where

import Control.Monad.Trans
import Data.List (isPrefixOf)
import System.Console.Repline
import System.Process (callCommand)

type Repl a = HaskelineT IO a

-- Evaluation : handle each line user inputs

cmd :: String -> Repl ()
cmd input = liftIO $ print input

-- Tab Completion: return a completion for partial words entered

completer :: Monad m => WordCompleter m
completer n = do
let names = ["kirk", "spock", "mccoy"]
return $ filter (isPrefixOf n) names

-- Commands
441 COMPILERS

help :: [String] -> Repl ()

help args = liftIO $ print $ "Help: " ++ show args

say :: [String] -> Repl ()

say args = do
_ <- liftIO $ callCommand $ "cowsay" ++ " " ++ (unwords args)
return ()

options :: [(String, [String] -> Repl ())]

options =
[ ("help", help), -- :help
("say", say) -- :say
]

ini :: Repl ()
ini = liftIO $ putStrLn "Welcome!"

repl :: IO ()
repl = evalRepl (pure ">>> ") cmd options Nothing (Word completer) ini

main :: IO ()
main = repl

Trying it out. ( <TAB> indicates a user keypress )

$ cabal run simple

Welcome!
>>> <TAB>
kirk spock mccoy

>>> k<TAB>
kirk

>>> spam
"spam"

>>> :say Hello Haskell

_______________
< Hello Haskell >
---------------
\ ^__^
\ (oo)\_______
(__)\ )\/\
||----w |
|| ||

See:

• repline
COMPILERS 442

LLVM
Haskell has a rich set of LLVM bindings that can generate LLVM and JIT dynamic code from inside of the Haskell run­
time. This is especially useful for building custom programming languages and compilers which need native performance.
The llvm­hs library is the de­facto standard for compiler construction in Haskell.
We can link effectively to the LLVM bindings which provide an efficient JIT which can generate fast code from runtime.
These can serve as the backend to an interpreter, generating fast SIMD operations for linear algebra, or compiling dataflow
representations of neural networks into code as fast as C from dynamic descriptions of logic in Haskell.
The llvm­hs library is split across two modules:
• llvm-hs-pure ­ Pure Haskell datatypes
• llvm-hs ­ Bindings to C++ framework for optimisation and JIT
The llvm-hs bindings allow us to construct LLVM abstract syntax tree by manipulating a variety of Haskell datatypes.
These datatypes all can be serialised to the C++ bindings to construct the LLVM module’s syntax tree.

import Control.Monad.Except
import Data.ByteString.Char8 as BS
import LLVM.AST
import qualified LLVM.AST as AST
import LLVM.AST.Global
import LLVM.Context
import LLVM.Module

int :: Type
int = IntegerType 32

defAdd :: Definition
defAdd =
GlobalDefinition
functionDefaults
{ name = Name "add",
parameters =
( [ Parameter int (Name "a") [],
Parameter int (Name "b") []
],
False
),
returnType = int,
basicBlocks = [body]
}
where
body =
BasicBlock
(Name "entry")
[ Name "result"
:= Add
False -- no signed wrap
False -- no unsigned wrap
(LocalReference int (Name "a"))
(LocalReference int (Name "b"))
[]
]
443 COMPILERS

(Do $ Ret (Just (LocalReference int (Name "result"))) [])

module_ :: AST.Module
module_ =
defaultModule
{ moduleName = "basic",
moduleDefinitions = [defAdd]
}

toLLVM :: AST.Module -> IO ()

toLLVM mod = withContext $ \ctx -> do
llvm <- withModuleFromAST ctx mod moduleLLVMAssembly
BS.putStrLn llvm

main :: IO ()
main = toLLVM module_

This will generate the following LLVM module which can be pretty printed out:

; ModuleID = 'basic'
source_filename = "<string>"

define i32 @add(i32 %a, i32 %b) {

entry:
%result = add i32 %a, %b
ret i32 %result
}

An alternative interface uses an IRBuilder monad which interactively constructs up the LLVM AST using monadic
combinators.

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-}

{-# LANGUAGE RecursiveDo #-}

module Main where

import Data.Text.Lazy.IO as T
import LLVM.AST hiding (function)
import qualified LLVM.AST.Constant as C
import qualified LLVM.AST.Float as F
import qualified LLVM.AST.IntegerPredicate as P
import LLVM.AST.Type as AST
import LLVM.IRBuilder.Instruction
import LLVM.IRBuilder.Module
import LLVM.IRBuilder.Monad

simple :: Module
simple = buildModule "exampleModule" $ mdo
function "f" [(AST.i32, "a")] AST.i32 $ \[a] -> mdo
_entry <- block `named` "entry"
cond <- icmp P.EQ a (ConstantOperand (C.Int 32 0))
condBr cond ifThen ifElse
COMPILERS 444

ifThen <- block

trVal <- add a (ConstantOperand (C.Int 32 0))
br ifExit
ifElse <- block `named` "if.else"
flVal <- add a (ConstantOperand (C.Int 32 0))
br ifExit
ifExit <- block `named` "if.exit"
r <- phi [(trVal, ifThen), (flVal, ifElse)]
ret r
function "plus" [(AST.i32, "x"), (AST.i32, "y")] AST.i32 $ \[x, y] -> do
_entry <- block `named` "entry2"
r <- add x y
ret r

main :: IO ()
main = print simple

See:
• llvm­hs
• llvm­hs­pure
• llvm­hs­examples
• Kaleidoscope Tutorial
• llvm­hs Github
Chapter 33

Template Haskell

Metaprogramming
Template Haskell is a very powerful set of abstractions, some might say too powerful. It effectively allows us to run
arbitrary code at compile­time to generate other Haskell code. You can some absolutely crazy things, like going off and
reading from the filesystem or doing network calls that informs how your code compiles leading to non­deterministic
builds.
While in some extreme cases TH is useful, some discretion is required when using this in production setting. Template­
Haskell can cause your build times to grow without bound, force you to manually sort all definitions your modules, and
generally produce unmaintainable code. If you find yourself falling back on metaprogramming ask yourself, what in my
abstractions has failed me such that my only option is to write code that writes code.
Consideration should be used before enabling TemplateHaskell. Consider an idiomatic solution first.

Quasiquotation
Quasiquotation allows us to express “quoted” blocks of syntax that need not necessarily be the syntax of the host language,
but unlike just writing a giant string it is instead parsed into some AST datatype in the host language. Notably values
from the host languages can be injected into the custom language via user­definable logic allowing information to flow
between the two languages.
In practice quasiquotation can be used to implement custom domain specific languages or integrate with other general
languages entirely via code­generation.
We’ve already seen how to write a Parsec parser, now let’s write a quasiquoter for it.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

module Quasiquote where

import Language.Haskell.TH
import Language.Haskell.TH.Syntax
import Language.Haskell.TH.Quote

import Text.Parsec
import Text.Parsec.String (Parser)
import Text.Parsec.Language (emptyDef)

445
TEMPLATE HASKELL 446

import qualified Text.Parsec.Expr as Ex

import qualified Text.Parsec.Token as Tok

import Control.Monad.Identity

data Expr
= Tr
| Fl
| Zero
| Succ Expr
| Pred Expr
deriving (Eq, Show)

instance Lift Expr where

lift Tr = [| Tr |]
lift Fl = [| Tr |]
lift Zero = [| Zero |]
lift (Succ a) = [| Succ a |]
lift (Pred a) = [| Pred a |]

type Op = Ex.Operator String () Identity

lexer :: Tok.TokenParser ()
lexer = Tok.makeTokenParser emptyDef

parens :: Parser a -> Parser a

parens = Tok.parens lexer

reserved :: String -> Parser ()

reserved = Tok.reserved lexer

semiSep :: Parser a -> Parser [a]

semiSep = Tok.semiSep lexer

reservedOp :: String -> Parser ()

reservedOp = Tok.reservedOp lexer

prefixOp :: String -> (a -> a) -> Op a

prefixOp x f = Ex.Prefix (reservedOp x >> return f)

table :: [[Op Expr]]

table = [
[ prefixOp "succ" Succ
, prefixOp "pred" Pred
]
]

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = Ex.buildExpressionParser table factor

true, false, zero :: Parser Expr

true = reserved "true" >> return Tr
447 TEMPLATE HASKELL

false = reserved "false" >> return Fl

zero = reservedOp "0" >> return Zero

factor :: Parser Expr

factor =
true
<|> false
<|> zero
<|> parens expr

contents :: Parser a -> Parser a

contents p = do
Tok.whiteSpace lexer
r <- p
eof
return r

toplevel :: Parser [Expr]

toplevel = semiSep expr

parseExpr :: String -> Either ParseError Expr

parseExpr s = parse (contents expr) "<stdin>" s

parseToplevel :: String -> Either ParseError [Expr]

parseToplevel s = parse (contents toplevel) "<stdin>" s

calcExpr :: String -> Q Exp

calcExpr str = do
filename <- loc_filename `fmap` location
case parse (contents expr) filename str of
Left err -> error (show err)
Right tag -> [| tag |]

calc :: QuasiQuoter
calc = QuasiQuoter calcExpr err err err
where err = error "Only defined for values"

Testing it out:

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

import Quasiquote

a :: Expr
a = [calc|true|]
-- Tr

b :: Expr
b = [calc|succ (succ 0)|]
-- Succ (Succ Zero)

c :: Expr
TEMPLATE HASKELL 448

c = [calc|pred (succ 0)|]

-- Pred (Succ Zero)

One extremely important feature is the ability to preserve position information so that errors in the embedded language
can be traced back to the line of the host syntax.

language­c­quote
Of course since we can provide an arbitrary parser for the quoted expression, one might consider embedding the AST of
another language entirely. For example C or CUDA C.

hello :: String -> C.Func

hello msg = [cfun|

int main(int argc, const char *argv[])

{
printf($msg);
return 0;
}

|]

Evaluating this we get back an AST representation of the quoted C program which we can manipulate or print back out
to textual C code using ppr function.

Func
(DeclSpec [] [] (Tint Nothing))
(Id "main")
DeclRoot
(Params
[ Param (Just (Id "argc")) (DeclSpec [] [] (Tint Nothing)) DeclRoot
, Param
(Just (Id "argv"))
(DeclSpec [] [ Tconst ] (Tchar Nothing))
(Array [] NoArraySize (Ptr [] DeclRoot))
]
False)
[ BlockStm
(Exp
(Just
(FnCall
(Var (Id "printf"))
[ Const (StringConst [ "\"Hello Haskell!\"" ] "Hello Haskell!")
])))
, BlockStm (Return (Just (Const (IntConst "0" Signed 0))))
]

In this example we just spliced in the anti­quoted Haskell string in the printf statement, but we can pass many other
values to and from the quoted expressions including identifiers, numbers, and other quoted expressions which implement
the Lift type class.
449 TEMPLATE HASKELL

GPU Kernels
For example now if we wanted programmatically generate the source for a CUDA kernel to run on a GPU we can switch
over the CUDA C dialect to emit the C code.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

import qualified Language.C.Quote.CUDA as Cuda

import qualified Language.C.Syntax as C
import Text.PrettyPrint.Mainland
import Text.PrettyPrint.Mainland.Class (Pretty (..))

cuda_fun :: String -> Int -> Float -> C.Func

cuda_fun fn n a =
[Cuda.cfun|

__global__ void $id:fn (float *x, float *y) {

int i = blockIdx.x*blockDim.x + threadIdx.x;
if ( i<$n ) { y[i] = $a*x[i] + y[i]; }
}

|]

cuda_driver :: String -> Int -> C.Func

cuda_driver fn n =
[Cuda.cfun|

void driver (float *x, float *y) {

float *d_x, *d_y;

cudaMalloc(&d_x, $n*sizeof(float));
cudaMalloc(&d_y, $n*sizeof(float));

cudaMemcpy(d_x, x, $n, cudaMemcpyHostToDevice);

cudaMemcpy(d_y, y, $n, cudaMemcpyHostToDevice);

$id:fn<<<($n+255)/256, 256>>>(d_x, d_y);

cudaFree(d_x);
cudaFree(d_y);
return 0;
}

|]

makeKernel :: String -> Float -> Int -> [C.Func]

makeKernel fn a n =
[ cuda_fun fn n a,
cuda_driver fn n
]

main :: IO ()
main = do
TEMPLATE HASKELL 450

let ker = makeKernel "saxpy" 2 65536

mapM_ (putDocLn . ppr) ker

Running this we generate:

__global__ void saxpy(float* x, float* y)

{
int i = blockIdx.x * blockDim.x + threadIdx.x;

if (i < 65536) {
y[i] = 2.0 * x[i] + y[i];
}
}
int driver(float* x, float* y)
{
float* d_x, * d_y;

cudaMalloc(&d_x, 65536 * sizeof(float));

cudaMalloc(&d_y, 65536 * sizeof(float));
cudaMemcpy(d_x, x, 65536, cudaMemcpyHostToDevice);
cudaMemcpy(d_y, y, 65536, cudaMemcpyHostToDevice);
saxpy<<<(65536 + 255) / 256, 256>>>(d_x, d_y);
return 0;
}

Pipe the resulting output through NVidia CUDA Compiler with nvcc -ptx -c to get the PTX associated with the
outputted code.

Template Haskell
Of course the most useful case of quasiquotation is the ability to procedurally generate Haskell code itself from inside of
Haskell. The template-haskell framework provides four entry points for the quotation to generate various types of
Haskell declarations and expressions.

Type Quasiquoted Class

Q Exp [e| ... |] expression
Q Pat [p| ... |] pattern
Q Type [t| ... |] type
Q [Dec] [d| ... |] declaration

data QuasiQuoter = QuasiQuoter

{ quoteExp :: String -> Q Exp
, quotePat :: String -> Q Pat
, quoteType :: String -> Q Type
, quoteDec :: String -> Q [Dec]
}

The logic evaluating, splicing, and introspecting compile­time values is embedded within the Q monad, which has a
runQ which can be used to evaluate its context. These functions of this monad is deeply embedded in the implemen­
451 TEMPLATE HASKELL

tation of GHC.

runQ :: Quasi m => Q a -> m a

runIO :: IO a -> Q a

Just as before, TemplateHaskell provides the ability to lift Haskell values into the their AST quantities within the quoted
expression using the Lift type class.

class Lift t where

lift :: t -> Q Exp

instance Lift Integer where

lift x = return (LitE (IntegerL x))

instance Lift Int where

lift x= return (LitE (IntegerL (fromIntegral x)))

instance Lift Char where

lift x = return (LitE (CharL x))

instance Lift Bool where

lift True = return (ConE trueName)
lift False = return (ConE falseName)

instance Lift a => Lift (Maybe a) where

lift Nothing = return (ConE nothingName)
lift (Just x) = liftM (ConE justName `AppE`) (lift x)

instance Lift a => Lift [a] where

lift xs = do { xs' <- mapM lift xs; return (ListE xs') }

In many cases Template Haskell can be used interactively to explore the AST form of various Haskell syntax.

λ: runQ [e| \x -> x |]

LamE [VarP x_2] (VarE x_2)

λ: runQ [d| data Nat = Z | S Nat |]

[DataD [] Nat_0 [] [NormalC Z_2 [],NormalC S_1 [(NotStrict,ConT Nat_0)]] []]

λ: runQ [p| S (S Z)|]

ConP Singleton.S [ConP Singleton.S [ConP Singleton.Z []]]

λ: runQ [t| Int -> [Int] |]

AppT (AppT ArrowT (ConT GHC.Types.Int)) (AppT ListT (ConT GHC.Types.Int))

λ: let g = $(runQ [| \x -> x |])

λ: g 3
3

Using Language.Haskell.TH we can piece together Haskell AST element by element but subject to our own custom
logic to generate the code. This can be somewhat painful though as the source­language (called HsSyn ) to Haskell is
TEMPLATE HASKELL 452

enormous, consisting of around 100 nodes in its AST many of which are dependent on the state of language pragmas.

-- builds the function (f = \(a,b) -> a)

f :: Q [Dec]
f = do
let f = mkName "f"
a <- newName "a"
b <- newName "b"
return [ FunD f [ Clause [TupP [VarP a, VarP b]] (NormalB (VarE a)) [] ] ]

my_id :: a -> a
my_id x = $( [| x |] )

main = print (my_id "Hello Haskell!")

As a debugging tool it is useful to be able to dump the reified information out for a given symbol interactively, to do so
there is a simple little hack.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

import Language.Haskell.TH
import Text.Show.Pretty (ppShow)

introspect :: Name -> Q Exp

introspect n = do
t <- reify n
runIO $ putStrLn $ ppShow t
[|return ()|]

λ: $(introspect 'id)
VarI
GHC.Base.id
(ForallT
[ PlainTV a_1627405383 ]
[]
(AppT (AppT ArrowT (VarT a_1627405383)) (VarT a_1627405383)))
Nothing
(Fixity 9 InfixL)

λ: $(introspect ''Maybe)
TyConI
(DataD
[]
Data.Maybe.Maybe
[ PlainTV a_1627399528 ]
[ NormalC Data.Maybe.Nothing []
, NormalC Data.Maybe.Just [ ( NotStrict , VarT a_1627399528 ) ]
]
453 TEMPLATE HASKELL

[])

import Language.Haskell.TH

foo :: Int -> Int

foo x = x + 1

data Bar

fooInfo :: InfoQ
fooInfo = reify 'foo

barInfo :: InfoQ
barInfo = reify ''Bar

$( [d| data T = T1 | T2 |] )

main = print [T1, T2]

Splices are indicated by $(f) syntax for the expression level and at the toplevel simply by invocation of the template
Haskell function. Running GHC with -ddump-splices shows our code being spliced in at the specific location in the
AST at compile­time.

$(f)

template_haskell_show.hs:1:1: Splicing declarations

f
======>
template_haskell_show.hs:8:3-10
f (a_a5bd, b_a5be) = a_a5bd

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

module Splice where

import Language.Haskell.TH
import Language.Haskell.TH.Syntax

spliceF :: Q [Dec]
spliceF = do
let f = mkName "f"
a <- newName "a"
b <- newName "b"
return [ FunD f [ Clause [VarP a, VarP b] (NormalB (VarE a)) [] ] ]

spliceG :: Lift a => a -> Q [Dec]

spliceG n = runQ [d| g a = n |]
TEMPLATE HASKELL 454

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

import Splice

spliceF
spliceG "argument"

main = do
print $ f 1 2
print $ g ()

At the point of the splice all variables and types used must be in scope, so it must appear after their declarations in
the module. As a result we often have to mentally topologically sort our code when using TemplateHaskell such that
declarations are defined in order.
See: Template Haskell AST

Antiquotation
Extending our quasiquotation from above now that we have TemplateHaskell machinery we can implement the same class
of logic that it uses to pass Haskell values in and pull Haskell values out via pattern matching on templated expressions.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}
{-# LANGUAGE DeriveDataTypeable #-}

module Antiquote where

import Data.Generics
import Language.Haskell.TH
import Language.Haskell.TH.Quote

import Text.Parsec
import Text.Parsec.String (Parser)
import Text.Parsec.Language (emptyDef)

import qualified Text.Parsec.Expr as Ex

import qualified Text.Parsec.Token as Tok

data Expr
= Tr
| Fl
| Zero
| Succ Expr
| Pred Expr
| Antiquote String
deriving (Eq, Show, Data, Typeable)

lexer :: Tok.TokenParser ()
lexer = Tok.makeTokenParser emptyDef
455 TEMPLATE HASKELL

parens :: Parser a -> Parser a

parens = Tok.parens lexer

reserved :: String -> Parser ()

reserved = Tok.reserved lexer

identifier :: Parser String

identifier = Tok.identifier lexer

semiSep :: Parser a -> Parser [a]

semiSep = Tok.semiSep lexer

reservedOp :: String -> Parser ()

reservedOp = Tok.reservedOp lexer

oper s f assoc = Ex.Prefix (reservedOp s >> return f)

table = [ oper "succ" Succ Ex.AssocLeft

, oper "pred" Pred Ex.AssocLeft
]

expr :: Parser Expr

expr = Ex.buildExpressionParser [table] factor

true, false, zero :: Parser Expr

true = reserved "true" >> return Tr
false = reserved "false" >> return Fl
zero = reservedOp "0" >> return Zero

antiquote :: Parser Expr

antiquote = do
char '$'
var <- identifier
return $ Antiquote var

factor :: Parser Expr

factor = true
<|> false
<|> zero
<|> antiquote
<|> parens expr

contents :: Parser a -> Parser a

contents p = do
Tok.whiteSpace lexer
r <- p
eof
return r

parseExpr :: String -> Either ParseError Expr

parseExpr s = parse (contents expr) "<stdin>" s
TEMPLATE HASKELL 456

class Expressible a where

express :: a -> Expr

instance Expressible Expr where

express = id

instance Expressible Bool where

express True = Tr
express False = Fl

instance Expressible Integer where

express 0 = Zero
express n = Succ (express (n - 1))

exprE :: String -> Q Exp

exprE s = do
filename <- loc_filename `fmap` location
case parse (contents expr) filename s of
Left err -> error (show err)
Right exp -> dataToExpQ (const Nothing `extQ` antiExpr) exp

exprP :: String -> Q Pat

exprP s = do
filename <- loc_filename `fmap` location
case parse (contents expr) filename s of
Left err -> error (show err)
Right exp -> dataToPatQ (const Nothing `extQ` antiExprPat) exp

-- antiquote RHS
antiExpr :: Expr -> Maybe (Q Exp)
antiExpr (Antiquote v) = Just embed
where embed = [| express $(varE (mkName v)) |]
antiExpr _ = Nothing

-- antiquote LHS
antiExprPat :: Expr -> Maybe (Q Pat)
antiExprPat (Antiquote v) = Just $ varP (mkName v)
antiExprPat _ = Nothing

mini :: QuasiQuoter
mini = QuasiQuoter exprE exprP undefined undefined

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

import Antiquote

-- extract
a :: Expr -> Expr
a [mini|succ $x|] = x

b :: Expr -> Expr

457 TEMPLATE HASKELL

b [mini|succ $x|] = [mini|pred $x|]

c :: Expressible a => a -> Expr

c x = [mini|succ $x|]

d :: Expr
d = c (8 :: Integer)
-- Succ (Succ (Succ (Succ (Succ (Succ (Succ (Succ Zero)))))))

e :: Expr
e = c True
-- Succ Tr

Templated Type Families

Just like at the value­level we can construct type­level constructions by piecing together their AST.

Type AST
---------- ----------
t1 -> t2 ArrowT `AppT` t2 `AppT` t2
[t] ListT `AppT` t
(t1,t2) TupleT 2 `AppT` t1 `AppT` t2

For example consider that type­level arithmetic is still somewhat incomplete in GHC 7.6, but there often cases where the
span of typelevel numbers is not full set of integers but is instead some bounded set of numbers. We can instead define
operations with a type­family instead of using an inductive definition ( which often requires manual proofs ) and simply
enumerates the entire domain of arguments to the type­family and maps them to some result computed at compile­time.

For example the modulus operator would be non­trivial to implement at type­level but instead we can use the
enumFamily function to splice in type­family which simply enumerates all possible pairs of numbers up to a desired
depth.

module EnumFamily where

import Language.Haskell.TH

enumFamily :: (Integer -> Integer -> Integer)

-> Name
-> Integer
-> Q [Dec]
enumFamily f bop upper = return decls
where
decls = do
i <- [1..upper]
j <- [2..upper]
return $ TySynInstD bop (rhs i j)

rhs i j = TySynEqn
[LitT (NumTyLit i), LitT (NumTyLit j)]
(LitT (NumTyLit (i `f` j)))
TEMPLATE HASKELL 458

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}

import Data.Proxy
import EnumFamily
import GHC.TypeLits hiding (Mod)

type family Mod (m :: Nat) (n :: Nat) :: Nat

type family Add (m :: Nat) (n :: Nat) :: Nat

type family Pow (m :: Nat) (n :: Nat) :: Nat

enumFamily mod ''Mod 10

enumFamily (+) ''Add 10

enumFamily (^) ''Pow 10

a :: Integer
a = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Mod 6 4))

-- 2

b :: Integer
b = natVal (Proxy :: Proxy (Pow 3 (Mod 6 4)))
-- 9

-- enumFamily mod ''Mod 3

-- ======>
-- template_typelevel_splice.hs:7:1-14
-- type instance Mod 2 1 = 0
-- type instance Mod 2 2 = 0
-- type instance Mod 2 3 = 2
-- type instance Mod 3 1 = 0
-- type instance Mod 3 2 = 1
-- type instance Mod 3 3 = 0
-- ...

In practice GHC seems fine with enormous type­family declarations although compile­time may increase a bit as a result.

The singletons library also provides a way to automate this process by letting us write seemingly value­level declarations
inside of a quasiquoter and then promoting the logic to the type­level. For example if we wanted to write a value­level
and type­level map function for our HList this would normally involve quite a bit of boilerplate, now it can stated very
concisely.

{-# LANGUAGE DataKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE GADTs #-}
{-# LANGUAGE KindSignatures #-}
459 TEMPLATE HASKELL

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}
{-# LANGUAGE StandaloneDeriving #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeFamilies #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE UndecidableInstances #-}

import Data.Singletons
import Data.Singletons.TH

$( promote
[d|
map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map _ [] = []
map f (x : xs) = f x : map f xs
|]
)

infixr 5 :::

data HList (ts :: [*]) where

Nil :: HList '[]
(:::) :: t -> HList ts -> HList (t ': ts)

-- TypeLevel
-- MapJust :: [*] -> [Maybe *]
type MapJust xs = Map Maybe xs

-- Value Level
-- mapJust :: [a] -> [Maybe a]
mapJust :: HList xs -> HList (MapJust xs)
mapJust Nil = Nil
mapJust (x ::: xs) = Just x ::: mapJust xs

type A = [Bool, String, Double, ()]

a :: HList A
a = True ::: "foo" ::: 3.14 ::: () ::: Nil

example1 :: HList (MapJust A)

example1 = mapJust a

-- example1 reduces to example2 when expanded

example2 :: HList [Maybe Bool, Maybe String, Maybe Double, Maybe ()]
example2 = Just True ::: Just "foo" ::: Just 3.14 ::: Just () ::: Nil

Templated Type Classes

Probably the most common use of Template Haskell is the automatic generation of type­class instances. Consider if we
wanted to write a simple Pretty printing class for a flat data structure that derived the ppr method in terms of the names
TEMPLATE HASKELL 460

of the constructors in the AST we could write a simple instance.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

module Class where

import Language.Haskell.TH

class Pretty a where

ppr :: a -> String

normalCons :: Con -> Name

normalCons (NormalC n _) = n

getCons :: Info -> [Name]

getCons cons = case cons of
TyConI (DataD _ _ _ tcons _) -> map normalCons tcons
con -> error $ "Can't derive for:" ++ (show con)

pretty :: Name -> Q [Dec]

pretty dt = do
info <- reify dt
Just cls <- lookupTypeName "Pretty"
let datatypeStr = nameBase dt
let cons = getCons info
let dtype = mkName (datatypeStr)
let mkInstance xs =
InstanceD
[] -- Context
(AppT
(ConT cls) -- Instance
(ConT dtype)) -- Head
[(FunD (mkName "ppr") xs)] -- Methods
let methods = map cases cons
return $ [mkInstance methods]

-- Pattern matches on the ``ppr`` method

cases :: Name -> Clause
cases a = Clause [ConP a []] (NormalB (LitE (StringL (nameBase a)))) []

In a separate file invoke the pretty instance at the toplevel, and with --ddump-splice if we want to view the spliced
class instance.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

import Class

data PlatonicSolid
= Tetrahedron
461 TEMPLATE HASKELL

| Cube
| Octahedron
| Dodecahedron
| Icosahedron

pretty ''PlatonicSolid

main :: IO ()
main = do
putStrLn (ppr Octahedron)
putStrLn (ppr Dodecahedron)

Multiline Strings
Haskell has no language support for multiline string literals, although we can emulate this by using a quasiquoter. The
resulting String literal is then converted using toString into whatever result type is desired.

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

module Multiline (s) where

import Data.String
import Language.Haskell.TH.Quote

s :: QuasiQuoter
s = QuasiQuoter
{ quoteExp = (\a -> [|fromString a|]) . trim
, quotePat = \_ -> fail "illegal raw string QuasiQuote"
, quoteType = \_ -> fail "illegal raw string QuasiQuote"
, quoteDec = \_ -> fail "illegal raw string QuasiQuote"
}

trim :: String -> String

trim ('\n':xs) = xs
trim xs = xs

In a separate module we can then enable Quasiquotes and embed the string.

{-# LANGUAGE QuasiQuotes #-}

import Multiline (s)

import qualified Data.Text as T

foo :: T.Text
foo = [s|
This
is
my
multiline
string
TEMPLATE HASKELL 462

|]

Path Files
Oftentimes it is necessary to embed the specific Git version hash of a build inside the executable. Using git­embed the
compiler will effectively shell out to the command line to retrieve the version information of the CWD Git repository
and use Template Haskell to define embed this information at compile­time. This is often useful for embedding in
--version information in the command line interface to your program or service.

This example also makes use of the Cabal Paths_pkgname module during compile time which contains which con­
tains several functions for querying target paths and included data files for the Cabal project. This can be included
in the exposed-modules of a package to be accessed directly by the project, otherwise it is placed automatically in
other-modules .

version :: Version
getBinDir :: IO FilePath
getLibDir :: IO FilePath
getDataDir :: IO FilePath
getLibexecDir :: IO FilePath
getSysconfDir :: IO FilePath
getDataFileName :: FilePath -> IO FilePath

An example of usage to query the Git metadata into the compiled binary of a project using the git-embed package:

{-# LANGUAGE TemplateHaskell #-}

import Git.Embed
import Data.Version
import Paths_myprog

gitRev :: String
gitRev = $(embedGitShortRevision)

gitBranch :: String
gitBranch = $(embedGitBranch)

ver :: String
ver = showVersion Paths_myprog.version
Chapter 34

Categories

Do I need to Learn Category Theory?

Short answer: No. Most of the idea of category theory aren’t really applicable to writing Haskell.
The long answer: It is not strictly necessary to learn, but so few things in life are. Learning new topics and ways of
thinking about problems only enrich your thinking and give you new ways of thinking about code and abstractions.
Category theory is never going to help you write a web application better but it may give you insights into problems that
algebraic in nature. A tiny group of Haskellers espouse philosophies about it being an inspiration for certain abstractions,
but most do not.
Some understanding of abstract algebra, and conventions for discussing algebraic structures and equational reasoning
with laws are essential to modern Haskell and we will discuss these leading up to some basic category theory.

Abstract Algebra
Algebraic theory taught at higher levels generalises notions of arithmetic to operate over more generic structures than
simple numbers. These structures are called sets and are a very broad notion of generic ways of describing groups of
mathematical objects that can be equated and grouped. Over these sets we can define ways of combining and operating
over elements of the set. These generalised notions of arithmetic are described in terms of and operations. Operations
which take elements of a set to the same set are said to be closed in the set. When discussing operations we use the
conventions:
• Properties ­ Predicates attached to values and operations over a set.
• Binary Operations ­ Operations which map two elements.
• Unary Operations ­ Operations which map a single element.
• Constants ­ Specific values with specific properties in a set.
• Relations ­ Pairings of elements in a set.
Binary operations are generalisations of operations like multiplication and addition. That map two elements of a set to
another element of a set. Unary operations map an element of a set to a single element of a set. Ternary operations map
three elements. Higher­level operations are usually not given specific names.
Constants are specific elements of the set, that generalise values like 0 and 1 which have specific laws in relation to the
operations defined over the set.
Certain properties show up so frequently we typically refer to their properties by an algebraic term. These terms are
drawn from an equivalent abstract algebra concept. Several of the common algebraic laws are defined in the table below.

463
CATEGORIES 464

Associativity
Equations:

a × (b × c) = (a × b) × c

Haskell:

a `op` (b `op` c) = (a `op` b) `op` c

Haskell Predicate:

associative :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> a -> Bool

associative op x y z = (x `op` y) `op` z == x `op` (y `op` z)

Commutativity
Equations:

a×b=b×a

Haskell:

a `op` b = b `op` a

Haskell Predicates:

commutative :: Eq a => (b -> b -> a) -> b -> b -> Bool

commutative op x y = x `op` y == y `op` x

Units
Equations:

a×e=a

e×a=a

Haskell:

a `op` e = a
e `op` a = a

Haskell Predicates:
465 CATEGORIES

leftIdentity :: Eq a => (b -> a -> a) -> b -> a -> Bool

leftIdentity op y x = y `op` x == x

rightIdentity :: Eq a => (a -> b -> a) -> b -> a -> Bool

rightIdentity op y x = x `op` y == x

identity :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool

identity op x y = leftIdentity op x y && rightIdentity op x y

Inversion
Equations:

a−1 × a = e

a × a−1 = e

Haskell:

(inv a) `op` a = e
a `op` (inv a) = e

Haskell Predicates:

leftInverse :: Eq a => (b -> b -> a) -> (b -> b) -> a -> b -> Bool
leftInverse op inv y x = inv x `op` x == y

rightInverse :: Eq a => (b -> b -> a) -> (b -> b) -> a -> b -> Bool
rightInverse op inv y x = x `op` inv x == y

inverse :: Eq a => (b -> b -> a) -> (b -> b) -> a -> b -> Bool
inverse op inv y x = leftInverse op inv y x && rightInverse op inv y x

Zeros
Equations:

a×0=0

0×a=0

Haskell

a `op` e = e
e `op` a = e
CATEGORIES 466

Haskell Predicates:

leftZero :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool

leftZero = flip . rightIdentity

rightZero :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool

rightZero = flip . leftIdentity

zero :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool

zero op x y = leftZero op x y && rightZero op x y

Linearity
Equations:

f (x + y) = f (x) + f (y)

Haskell:

f (x `op` y) = f x `op` f y

Haskell Predicates:

linear :: Eq a => (a -> a) -> (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool
linear f (#) x y = f (x # y) == ((f x) # (f y))

Idempotency
Equations:

f (f (x)) = f (x)

f (f x) = f x

Haskell Predicates:

idempotent :: Eq a => (a -> a) -> a -> Bool

idempotent f x = f (f x)

Distributivity
Equations:

a × (b + c) = (a × b) + (a × c)

(b + c) × a = (b × a) + (c × a)
467 CATEGORIES

Haskell:

a `f` (b `g` c) = (a `f` b) `g` (a `f` c)

(b `g` c) `f` a = (b `f` a) `g` (c `f` a)

Haskell Predicates:

leftDistributive :: Eq a => (a -> b -> a) -> (a -> a -> a) -> b -> a -> a -> Bool
leftDistributive ( # ) op x y z = (y `op` z) # x == (y # x) `op` (z # x)

rightDistributive :: Eq a => (b -> a -> a) -> (a -> a -> a) -> b -> a -> a -> Bool
rightDistributive ( # ) op x y z = x # (y `op` z) == (x # y) `op` (x # z)

distributivity :: Eq a => (a -> a -> a) -> (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> a -> Bool
distributivity op op' x y z = op (op' x y) z == op' (op x z) (op y z)
&& op x (op' y z) == op' (op x y) (op x z)

Anticommutativity
Equations:

a × b = (b × a)−1

Haskell:

a `op` b = inv (b `op` a)

Haskell Predicates:

anticommutative :: Eq a => (a -> a) -> (a -> a -> a) -> a -> a -> Bool
anticommutative inv op x y = x `op` y == inv (y `op` x)

Homomorphisms
Equations:

f (x × y) = f (x) + f (y)

Haskell:

f (a `op0` b) = (f a) `op1` (f b)

Haskell Predicates:

homomorphism :: Eq a =>
(b -> a) -> (b -> b -> b) -> (a -> a -> a) -> b -> b -> Bool
homomorphism f op0 op1 x y = f (x `op0` y) == f x `op1` f y
CATEGORIES 468

Combinations of these properties over multiple functions gives rise to higher order systems of relations that occur over
and over again throughout functional programming, and once we recognize them we can abstract over them. For instance
a monoid is a combination of a unit and a single associative operation over a set of values.
You will often see this notation in tuple form. Where a set S (called the carrier) will be enriched with a variety of
operations and elements that are closed over that set. For example a semigroup is a set equipped with an associative
closed binary operation. If you add an identity element e to the semigroup you get a monoid.

Structure Notation
Semigroup (S, r )
Monoid (S, r , e)
Monad (S, µ, η)

Categories
The most basic structure is a category which is an algebraic structure of objects ( Obj ) and morphisms ( Hom ) with the
structure that morphisms compose associatively and the existence of an identity morphism for each object. A category
is defined entirely in terms of its:
• Elements
• Morphisms
• Composition Operation
A morphism f written as f : x → y an abstraction on the algebraic notion of homomorphisms. It is an arrow between
two objects in a category x and y called the domain and codomain respectively. The set of all morphisms between two
given elements x and y is called the hom­set and written Hom(x, y).
In Haskell, with kind polymorphism enabled we can write down the general category parameterized by a type variable
“c” for category. This is the instance Hask the category of Haskell types with functions between types as morphisms.

{-# LANGUAGE PolyKinds #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}
{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}

import Prelude hiding ((.), id)

-- Morphisms
type (a ~> b) c = c a b

class Category (c :: k -> k -> *) where

id :: (a ~> a) c
(.) :: (y ~> z) c -> (x ~> y) c -> (x ~> z) c

type Hask = (->)

instance Category Hask where

id x = x
(f . g) x = f (g x)

Categories are interesting since they exhibit various composition properties and ways in which various elements in the
category can be composed and rewritten while preserving several invariants about the program.
Some annoying curmudgeons will sometimes pit nicks about this not being a “real category” because all Haskell values
469 CATEGORIES

are potentially inhabited by a bottom type which violates several rules of composition. This is mostly silly nit­picking
and for the sake of discussion we’ll consider “ideal Haskell” which does not have this property.

Isomorphisms
Two objects of a category are said to be isomorphic if we can construct a morphism with 2­sided inverse that takes the
structure of an object to another form and back to itself when inverted.

f :: a -> b
f' :: b -> a

Such that:

f . f' = id
f' . f = id

For example the types Either () a and Maybe a are isomorphic.

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

data Iso a b = Iso { to :: a -> b, from :: b -> a }

f :: forall a. Maybe a -> Either () a

f (Just a) = Right a
f Nothing = Left ()

f' :: forall a. Either () a -> Maybe a

f' (Left _) = Nothing
f' (Right a) = Just a

iso :: Iso (Maybe a) (Either () a)

iso = Iso f f'

data V = V deriving Eq

ex1 = f (f' (Right V)) == Right V

ex2 = f' (f (Just V)) == Just V

data Iso a b = Iso { to :: a -> b, from :: b -> a }

instance Category Iso where

id = Iso id id
(Iso f f') . (Iso g g') = Iso (f . g) (g' . f')

Duality
One of the central ideas is the notion of duality, that reversing some internal structure yields a new structure with a
“mirror” set of theorems. The dual of a category reverse the direction of the morphisms forming the category COp.
CATEGORIES 470

import Control.Category
import Prelude hiding ((.), id)

newtype Op a b = Op (b -> a)

instance Category Op where

id = Op id
(Op f) . (Op g) = Op (g . f)

See:
• Duality for Haskellers

Functors
Functors are mappings between the objects and morphisms of categories that preserve identities and composition.

{-# LANGUAGE MultiParamTypeClasses #-}

{-# LANGUAGE TypeSynonymInstances #-}

import Control.Category
import Prelude hiding (Functor, fmap, id)

class (Category c, Category d) => Functor c d t where

fmap :: c a b -> d (t a) (t b)

type Hask = (->)

instance Functor Hask Hask [] where

fmap f [] = []
fmap f (x : xs) = f x : (fmap f xs)

fmap id ≡ id
fmap (a . b) ≡ (fmap a) . (fmap b)

Natural Transformations
Natural transformations are mappings between functors that are invariant under interchange of morphism composition
order.

type Nat f g = forall a. f a -> g a

Such that for a natural transformation h we have:

fmap f . h ≡ h . fmap f

The simplest example is between ( f = List ) and ( g = Maybe ) types.

471 CATEGORIES

headMay :: forall a. [a] -> Maybe a

headMay [] = Nothing
headMay (x:xs) = Just x

Regardless of how we chase safeHead , we end up with the same result.

fmap f (headMay xs) ≡ headMay (fmap f xs)

fmap f (headMay [])

= fmap f Nothing
= Nothing

headMay (fmap f [])

= headMay []
= Nothing

fmap f (headMay (x:xs))

= fmap f (Just x)
= Just (f x)

headMay (fmap f (x:xs))

= headMay [f x]
= Just (f x)

Or consider the Functor (->) .

f :: (Functor t)
=> (->) a b
-> (->) (t a) (t b)
f = fmap

g :: (b -> c)
-> (->) a b
-> (->) a c
g = (.)

c :: (Functor t)
=> (b -> c)
-> (->) (t a) (t b)
-> (->) (t a) (t c)
c = f . g

f . g x = c x . g

A lot of the expressive power of Haskell types comes from the interesting fact that, with a few caveats, polymorphic
Haskell functions are natural transformations.

See: You Could Have Defined Natural Transformations

CATEGORIES 472

Kleisli Category
Kleisli composition (i.e. Kleisli Fish) is defined to be:

(>=>) :: Monad m => (a -> m b) -> (b -> m c) -> a -> m c

f >=> g ≡ \x -> f x >>= g

(<=<) :: Monad m => (b -> m c) -> (a -> m b) -> a -> m c

(<=<) = flip (>=>)

The monad laws stated in terms of the Kleisli category of a monad m are stated much more symmetrically as one
associativity law and two identity laws.

(f >=> g) >=> h ≡ f >=> (g >=> h)

return >=> f ≡ f
f >=> return ≡ f

Stated simply that the monad laws above are just the category laws in the Kleisli category.

{-# LANGUAGE TypeOperators #-}

{-# LANGUAGE ExplicitForAll #-}

import Control.Monad
import Control.Category
import Prelude hiding ((.))

-- Kleisli category
newtype Kleisli m a b = K (a -> m b)

-- Kleisli morphisms ( a -> m b )

type (a :~> b) m = Kleisli m a b

instance Monad m => Category (Kleisli m) where

id = K return
(K f) . (K g) = K (f <=< g)

just :: (a :~> a) Maybe

just = K Just

left :: forall a b. (a :~> b) Maybe -> (a :~> b) Maybe

left f = just . f

right :: forall a b. (a :~> b) Maybe -> (a :~> b) Maybe

right f = f . just

For example, Just is just an identity morphism in the Kleisli category of the Maybe monad.

Just >=> f ≡ f
f >=> Just ≡ f
473 CATEGORIES

Monoidal Categories
On top of the basic category structure there are other higher­level objects that can be constructed that enrich the category
with additional operations.

• A bifunctor is a functor whose domain is the product of two categories.

• A monoidal category is a category which has a tensor product and a unit object.
• A braided monoidal category is a category which has tensor product and an operation braid which swaps
elements in the tensor product.
• A cartesian monoidal category is a is a monoidal category with, binary product, and diagonal.
• A cartesian closed category has is a monoidal category with a terminal object, binary products and exponential
objects.

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleContexts #-}

{-# LANGUAGE FlexibleInstances #-}
{-# LANGUAGE FunctionalDependencies #-}

import Prelude hiding ((.))

class Category k where

id :: k a a
(.) :: k b c -> k a b -> k a c

class Category k => Bifunctor k p where

bimap :: k a b -> k a' b' -> k (p a a') (p b b')

class Bifunctor k p => Associative k p where

associate :: k (p (p a b) c) (p a (p b c))
coassociate :: k (p a (p b c)) (p (p a b) c)

class Associative k p => Monoidal k p i | k p -> i where

idl :: k (p i a) a
idr :: k (p a i) a
coidl :: k a (p i a)
coidr :: k a (p a i)

class Braided k p where

braid :: k (p a b) (p b a)

class (Monoidal k prod i, Braided k prod) => Cartesian k prod i | k -> prod i where
fst :: k (prod a b) a
snd :: k (prod a b) b
diag :: k a (prod a a)
(&&&) :: k a b -> k a c -> k a (prod b c)
f &&& g = (f `bimap` g) . diag

class Cartesian k p i => CCC k p i e | k -> p i e where

apply :: k (p (e a b) a) b
curry :: k (p a b) c -> k a (e b c)
uncurry :: k a (e b c) -> k (p a b) c

An example of this tower is is the Hask with (->) as exponential, (,) as product and () as unit object.
CATEGORIES 474

type Hask = (->)

instance Category (->) where

id = Prelude.id
(.) = (Prelude..)

instance Bifunctor (->) (,) where

bimap f g = \(a,b) -> (f a,g b)

instance Associative (->) (,) where

associate ((a,b),c) = (a,(b,c))
coassociate (a,(b,c)) = ((a,b),c)

instance Monoidal (->) (,) () where

idl ((),a) = a
idr (a,()) = a
coidl a = ((),a)
coidr a = (a,())

instance Braided (->) (,) where

braid (a,b) = (b,a)

instance Cartesian (->) (,) () where

fst = Prelude.fst
snd = Prelude.snd
diag x = (x,x)

instance CCC (->) (,) () (->) where

apply (f,a) = f a
curry = Prelude.curry
uncurry = Prelude.uncurry

Further Resources
Category theory is an entire branch of mathematics that should be studeid independently of Haskell and programming.
The classic text is “Category Theory” by Awodey. This text assumes a undergraduate level mathematics background.
• Category Theory, Awodey
For a programming perspective there are several lectures and functional programming oriented resources:
• Category Theory for Programmers PDF
• Category Theory for Programmers Lectures
• Category Theory Foundations
Chapter 35

Source Code

All code is available from this Github repository. This code is dedicated to the public domain. You can copy, modify,
distribute and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission.
https://github.com/sdiehl/wiwinwlh
Chapters:
• 01­basics/
• 02­monads/
• 03­monad­transformers/
• 04­extensions/
• 05­laziness/
• 06­prelude/
• 07­text­bytestring/
• 08­applicatives/
• 09­errors/
• 10­advanced­monads/
• 11­quantification/
• 12­gadts/
• 13­lambda­calculus/
• 14­interpreters/
• 15­testing/
• 16­type­families/
• 17­promotion/
• 18­generics/
• 19­numbers/
• 20­data­structures/
• 21­ffi/
• 22­concurrency/
• 23­graphics/
• 24­parsing/
• 25­streaming/
• 26­data­formats/
• 27­web/
• 28­databases/
• 29­ghc/
• 30­languages/
• 31­template­haskell/
• 32­cryptography/
• 33­categories/

475
SOURCE CODE 476

• 34­time/
Haskell is an advanced general purpose programming language. This tutorial covers
all aspects of Haskell development from foundations to compiler development.
1. Basics
2. Monads
3. Monad Transformers
4. Language Extensions
5. Type Classes
6. Laziness
7. Prelude
8. Strings
9. Applicatives
10. Error Handling
11. Advanced Monads
12. Quantification
13. Generalized Algebraic Datatypes
14. Interpreters
15. Testing
16. Type Families
17. Promotion
18. Generics
19. Mathematics
20. Data Structures
21. Foreign Function Interface
22. Concurrency & Parallelism
23. Graphics
24. Parsers
25. Stream Processing
26. Cryptography
27. Date & Time
28. Data Formats & Serialisation
29. Network & Web Programming
30. Databases
31. GHC Compiler
32. Profiling
33. Compiler Development
34. Template Haskell
35. Category Theory