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I agree. I've never used Haskell at work (apart from some toy projects I did completely on my own as proof-of-concepts and/or quick-fixes) but I did spend a fai

I agree. I've never used Haskell at work (apart from some toy projects I did completely on my own as proof-of-concepts and/or quick-fixes) but I did spend a fair amount of time learning it myself, and that's what it took to get to the point where I could understand what was going on in "real" projects, let alone contribute at that level. And, yes, Lens is where I stopped. I grokked the basic mechanism and used the library in some limited cases but a real understanding of the whole zoo of Lens-related types always eluded me. Doubtless I could have figured it out given time, but working on my own toward my own goals it was a real slog. So I started learning Rust instead. :) Oh, and TH is an absolute nightmare. Just putting that out there. No, I don't know how I'd do it better.

tome 7y ago
As someone who is very interested in the experience of people learning Haskell I'd like to ask a question. Why did you stop learning Haskell after lens eluded you, rather than just turning your attention to some other aspect of Haskell instead? (After all, I've been interested in lens since it first came out seven or so years ago. I'd consider myself an expert in that type of technology and yet there are still parts I don't understand!)
- caconym_ 7y ago
  I felt that I'd reached a point of reasonable proficiency with the language, and since I'd been learning it mostly for my own entertainment I decided to turn my attention to some other new hotness (Rust, IIRC) rather than slog through increasingly more difficult and obscure (to me) features of the language with diminishing returns for my personal projects. Entertainment is maybe not the right word, though it was definitely entertaining. Learning Haskell was the beginning of a personal renaissance in my approach to programming, and as a self-taught programmer (and professional software engineer looking to expand my horizons) that was a huge deal.
  - tome 7y ago
    > I felt that I'd reached a point of reasonable proficiency with the language Ah, well that puts quite a different spin on things!
    - caconym_ 7y ago
      What, you think I was wrong? :) (that very well may be the case)
      - tome 7y ago
        No, not at all! I previously thought you meant "Haskell was hard for me to learn because I couldn't even learn lens" when you meant "I learned a lot of Haskell but couldn't be bothered to learn lens"

tome 7y ago

As someone who is very interested in the experience of people learning Haskell I'd like to ask a question. Why did you stop learning Haskell after lens eluded you, rather than just turning your attention to some other aspect of Haskell instead? (After all, I've been interested in lens since it first came out seven or so years ago. I'd consider myself an expert in that type of technology and yet there are still parts I don't understand!)

caconym_ 7y ago
I felt that I'd reached a point of reasonable proficiency with the language, and since I'd been learning it mostly for my own entertainment I decided to turn my attention to some other new hotness (Rust, IIRC) rather than slog through increasingly more difficult and obscure (to me) features of the language with diminishing returns for my personal projects. Entertainment is maybe not the right word, though it was definitely entertaining. Learning Haskell was the beginning of a personal renaissance in my approach to programming, and as a self-taught programmer (and professional software engineer looking to expand my horizons) that was a huge deal.
- tome 7y ago
  > I felt that I'd reached a point of reasonable proficiency with the language Ah, well that puts quite a different spin on things!
  - caconym_ 7y ago
    What, you think I was wrong? :) (that very well may be the case)
    - tome 7y ago
      No, not at all! I previously thought you meant "Haskell was hard for me to learn because I couldn't even learn lens" when you meant "I learned a lot of Haskell but couldn't be bothered to learn lens"