4 ms·

> Given that you want write code that sees "real world" use, and is used to handle data and events from the real world. Real world? As opposed to what? Is the

> Given that you want write code that sees "real world" use, and is used to handle data and events from the real world. Real world? As opposed to what? Is there any benefit to answering such polemical questions as if they are not rhetorical?

lukan 2y ago
As opposed to the abstract academic world? The only time I had contact with Haskell was in university and I did not see it appealing back then, nor now, nor have I ever seen a program that I use, written in it. So learning a bit of pure Haskell might have been beneficial for me to become a better programmer, but I still fail to see it being more than that - a academic language. Useful for didactic purposes. Less to actually ship software.
- padthai 2y ago
  > nor have I ever seen a program that I use, written in it The only mass market Haskell software that I know of is Pandoc. Others like Shellcheck and Postgrest are popular in their niche. I am not sure that Haskell is faring worse that other programming languages in its level of popularity, like Julia, Clojure or Erlang.
  - lukan 2y ago
    Pandoc seems useful, but maybe "mass market" is a bit of an overstatement? And since many programmers like myself had to learn Haskell, I think Haskell should have a better head start and be in a better position, if it would be so useful for "real world" use cases. But please don't take this as an attack on haskell. I have nothing against the language, or its users and I did not suffered because of it in university, I am just curious on the appeal. Because I love clean solutions, but I also want to ship things. So part of me are wondering if I am missing out, but I so far I see not much convincing data. (But I am also mainly interested in high performance and real time graphics and haskell is really not the best here)
    - itishappy 2y ago
      Pandoc is the standard for markdown conversion. Check out the comments in this recent thread (or pretty much any thread where markdown is mentioned): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40695628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40695628 https://hn.algolia.com/?q=markdown https://hn.algolia.com/?q=markdown
      - lukan 2y ago
        I don't think markdown conversion is a mass market application, but maybe personally I will indeed use it soon, so that would be something I guess ..
        keybored 2y ago
        You originally asked about a program that you use (or would use?) written in Haskell. Someone brought up Pandoc, the swiss army knife of Markdown and similar formats, and every programmer uses Markdown in some capacity. Then you chose to fixate on the phrase “mass market” software, as if that was relevant to your original claim: a program that a programmer would use. Which demonstrates my point. Someone with this attitude has already dug their heels in and made up their mind.
    - padthai 2y ago
      I am not a user of the language (although I learned it like you). I just came to chime in that (a) there is at least one very popular software written in Haskell and (b) Haskell seems to ship a good amount of software for its popularity. Haskell never got the “killer framework” like Rails or Spark that allowed to become more mainstream, even if it was teached in Universities all over the world.
      - lukan 2y ago
        "Haskell never got the “killer framework” like Rails or Spark that allowed to become more mainstream" But why is that the case? Thinking about writing a "killer framework" with huskell gives me a headache. Doing UI in huskell? Eventloop? Callbacks? Is that even possible, without doing awkward workarounds?

lukan 2y ago

As opposed to the abstract academic world? The only time I had contact with Haskell was in university and I did not see it appealing back then, nor now, nor have I ever seen a program that I use, written in it. So learning a bit of pure Haskell might have been beneficial for me to become a better programmer, but I still fail to see it being more than that - a academic language. Useful for didactic purposes. Less to actually ship software.

padthai 2y ago
> nor have I ever seen a program that I use, written in it The only mass market Haskell software that I know of is Pandoc. Others like Shellcheck and Postgrest are popular in their niche. I am not sure that Haskell is faring worse that other programming languages in its level of popularity, like Julia, Clojure or Erlang.
- lukan 2y ago
  Pandoc seems useful, but maybe "mass market" is a bit of an overstatement? And since many programmers like myself had to learn Haskell, I think Haskell should have a better head start and be in a better position, if it would be so useful for "real world" use cases. But please don't take this as an attack on haskell. I have nothing against the language, or its users and I did not suffered because of it in university, I am just curious on the appeal. Because I love clean solutions, but I also want to ship things. So part of me are wondering if I am missing out, but I so far I see not much convincing data. (But I am also mainly interested in high performance and real time graphics and haskell is really not the best here)
  - itishappy 2y ago
    Pandoc is the standard for markdown conversion. Check out the comments in this recent thread (or pretty much any thread where markdown is mentioned): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40695628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40695628 https://hn.algolia.com/?q=markdown https://hn.algolia.com/?q=markdown
    - lukan 2y ago
      I don't think markdown conversion is a mass market application, but maybe personally I will indeed use it soon, so that would be something I guess ..
      - keybored 2y ago
        You originally asked about a program that you use (or would use?) written in Haskell. Someone brought up Pandoc, the swiss army knife of Markdown and similar formats, and every programmer uses Markdown in some capacity. Then you chose to fixate on the phrase “mass market” software, as if that was relevant to your original claim: a program that a programmer would use. Which demonstrates my point. Someone with this attitude has already dug their heels in and made up their mind.
  - padthai 2y ago
    I am not a user of the language (although I learned it like you). I just came to chime in that (a) there is at least one very popular software written in Haskell and (b) Haskell seems to ship a good amount of software for its popularity. Haskell never got the “killer framework” like Rails or Spark that allowed to become more mainstream, even if it was teached in Universities all over the world.
    - lukan 2y ago
      "Haskell never got the “killer framework” like Rails or Spark that allowed to become more mainstream" But why is that the case? Thinking about writing a "killer framework" with huskell gives me a headache. Doing UI in huskell? Eventloop? Callbacks? Is that even possible, without doing awkward workarounds?