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I don't think annonymous functions have anything special to do with FP or OO for that matter. Maybe someone can fill in on this? In my mind, functional program

I don't think annonymous functions have anything special to do with FP or OO for that matter. Maybe someone can fill in on this? In my mind, functional programming is about programming with mathematical functions - Purity - No arbitrary effects being thrown around - Input to output... Ba-Da-Boom-Ba-Da-Bing. I find this much more valuable as a restriction from the runtime than as a guideline that can be ignored whenever deemed convenient. That being said, I wouldn't have a job if I couldn't compromise on this :( Is there any way to enforce some purity in F#? Does the type-system annotate effectfulness?

ungzd 10y ago
When I last used F#, I had no problems with purity — it's not enforced but it's a default in standard library and it's convenient.
Ace17 10y ago
> I don't think annonymous functions have anything special to do with FP or OO for that matter. Maybe someone can fill in on this? Anonymous functions are of no use until functions are first-class citizens (otherwise, there's no way to call them!), and this has always been the case in FP languages. I do agree though that the focus on mathematical "purity" is a much more defining characteristic of FP.
- rbehrends 10y ago
  Closures were an integral part of Smalltalk's design. And functions as first class citizens is not a particularly high bar. I mean, C has higher order functions.
  - opvasger 10y ago
    I'm excited to use higher-order functions in C someday :)
    - rbehrends 10y ago
      You can do that now. Higher-order functions are simply functions that can take other functions as parameters or return them as results. C has been able to do that since forever. It's not something fancy: pretty much every programming language has something along these lines. What is rarer is closures, but that's a different concept. You can have higher-order functions without having closures.
      - opvasger 10y ago
        Haha - I'm simply stating that I'm excited to do it and not for it to be possible :P
- opvasger 10y ago
  C# & Java has anonymous functions, but not 1st-class functions AFAIK EDIT: but then again, they truely are of no use :P hehe

ungzd 10y ago

When I last used F#, I had no problems with purity — it's not enforced but it's a default in standard library and it's convenient.

Ace17 10y ago

> I don't think annonymous functions have anything special to do with FP or OO for that matter. Maybe someone can fill in on this? Anonymous functions are of no use until functions are first-class citizens (otherwise, there's no way to call them!), and this has always been the case in FP languages. I do agree though that the focus on mathematical "purity" is a much more defining characteristic of FP.

rbehrends 10y ago
Closures were an integral part of Smalltalk's design. And functions as first class citizens is not a particularly high bar. I mean, C has higher order functions.
- opvasger 10y ago
  I'm excited to use higher-order functions in C someday :)
  - rbehrends 10y ago
    You can do that now. Higher-order functions are simply functions that can take other functions as parameters or return them as results. C has been able to do that since forever. It's not something fancy: pretty much every programming language has something along these lines. What is rarer is closures, but that's a different concept. You can have higher-order functions without having closures.
    - opvasger 10y ago
      Haha - I'm simply stating that I'm excited to do it and not for it to be possible :P
opvasger 10y ago
C# & Java has anonymous functions, but not 1st-class functions AFAIK EDIT: but then again, they truely are of no use :P hehe