4 ms·

F# is a wonderful language, albeit I'm still getting used to style. Is anyone here using F# for real project? It would be great to see it in wild.

louthy 12y ago
I'm using it on a number of proprietary projects. Check out [1] for a ton of 'in the wild' projects: [1] https://github.com/fsprojects https://github.com/fsprojects
DanielBMarkham 12y ago
Bunch of folks are. I've used it for several. I think there have been a couple of AskHNs for this. I'd show mine but you wouldn't see any code! My latest is http://newspaper23.com http://newspaper23.com I use F# to generate static pages. This allows me to completely decouple the back-end from the display. I don't have interactivity yet, but I really don't see a need to add a framework to get it. F# and mono allows me to shoot for brutal simplicity. I like that. Many times projects that might be huge monstrocities in other languages turn out to be just a few well-coded modules running as Unix-y microservices in F#. People are starting to give F# a lot of love as a .NET language, then wondering "Where's the framework?" I'm coming around to the conclusion that it works best when there is no framework. Fun times ahead.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- noblethrasher 12y ago
  > People are starting to give F# a lot of love as a .NET language, then wondering "Where's the framework?" I'm coming around to the conclusion that it works best when there is no framework. Yes, in F# and other ML-like languages you tend to use libraries more than frameworks. (I'm the original poster, and I've been extolling the virtues of ML-style functional programming throughout this thread, but I still owe you an email explaining why I think OOP is ultimately better than FP)
jackfoxy 12y ago
Tachyus uses F# almost exclusively. We have had great success with it. Just released 2.0 of our stack to production. After a week, still no issues. We use it for server-side web development in Azure, iOS app with Xamarin, and Raspberry Pi Linux. Fantastic integration with SQL Server throught the SqlClient Type Provider. It's great having one language across platforms.
- FlyingSnake 12y ago
  How does Raspberry Pi fit into the whole picture? Is it used as an 'Internet of things' device to collect telemetry data?
  - jackfoxy 12y ago
    Yes.
cflyingdutchman 12y ago
Jet.com is using F# as their core language. (and hiring) http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/16/quidsi-co-founder-raises-an-additional-20m-for-a-new-e-commerce-biz/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/16/quidsi-co-founder-raises-an...
curveship 12y ago
I've used it for parts of two commercial projects (not counting side projects). One was a small parser -- C#'s parser options were uninspiring while FParsec (based on Haskell's Parsec) was great. The other was to simulate a client-server algorithm we were developing under different network situations. F#'s ability to express algorithms concisely was a real win there. Side projects have mostly been stats/data based: using type providers to mash together different data sources, with visualization via FSharp.Charting.
MichaelGG 12y ago
I use it in telecom (VoIP). At peak, we were doing 1 billion calls a day. All routing decisions, F#. All call records, F# (on Mono). I've also used it in network indexing, processing 5TB of SIP signalling a day on a single server, then indexing and storing each packet for later searching. This is now used in the voice arm of a large public telco to provide troubleshooting. F# is a joy to work with and every time I use C# it's annoying.
- FlyingSnake 12y ago
  F# on Mono, that's great. Did you face any major roadblocks with Mono/F# in production?
  - MichaelGG 12y ago
    No, honestly, the biggest issue was just remembering to install the F# libraries. Actually, the biggest issue is mono-service. Since we run cross platform, we used the Windows service API instead of writing a normal daemon. This has been a source of "random" issues with getting it to start. But that's just our fault for not changing 10 lines of code and just running it like every other Linux daemon. Similarly, some code depended on file locking (because FreeSWITCH's CDR writers don't properly write to files) which doesn't work on any popular Linux file systems. There are probably some other little issues where we made a dumb Windows only assumption. All in all, it's been smooth sailing. Stuff just works. We develop and test exclusively on Windows, then deploy the binaries to Linux. I can't say enough good things about F# and about Mono. Also, I don't use it on Linux, but F# Interactive would only work on some installs. A problem with readline iirc. I'd guess that developing on Linux will be more rocky than using Visual Studio.
sbrother 12y ago
I used it for an internal app that's getting used by several of the top global pharma companies to solve an optimization problem. I would choose F# again in heartbeat for that sort of project: its expressiveness let me implement the core algorithm in just a few hundred lines of fast, readable code, and its seamless interface with Microsoft-world allowed me to to embed it in a standard "Enterprise" stack (a C#/WPF desktop app as well as an ASP .NET webapp).

louthy 12y ago

I'm using it on a number of proprietary projects. Check out [1] for a ton of 'in the wild' projects: [1] https://github.com/fsprojects https://github.com/fsprojects

DanielBMarkham 12y ago

Bunch of folks are. I've used it for several. I think there have been a couple of AskHNs for this. I'd show mine but you wouldn't see any code! My latest is http://newspaper23.com http://newspaper23.com I use F# to generate static pages. This allows me to completely decouple the back-end from the display. I don't have interactivity yet, but I really don't see a need to add a framework to get it. F# and mono allows me to shoot for brutal simplicity. I like that. Many times projects that might be huge monstrocities in other languages turn out to be just a few well-coded modules running as Unix-y microservices in F#. People are starting to give F# a lot of love as a .NET language, then wondering "Where's the framework?" I'm coming around to the conclusion that it works best when there is no framework. Fun times ahead.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
noblethrasher 12y ago
> People are starting to give F# a lot of love as a .NET language, then wondering "Where's the framework?" I'm coming around to the conclusion that it works best when there is no framework. Yes, in F# and other ML-like languages you tend to use libraries more than frameworks. (I'm the original poster, and I've been extolling the virtues of ML-style functional programming throughout this thread, but I still owe you an email explaining why I think OOP is ultimately better than FP)

jackfoxy 12y ago

Tachyus uses F# almost exclusively. We have had great success with it. Just released 2.0 of our stack to production. After a week, still no issues. We use it for server-side web development in Azure, iOS app with Xamarin, and Raspberry Pi Linux. Fantastic integration with SQL Server throught the SqlClient Type Provider. It's great having one language across platforms.

FlyingSnake 12y ago
How does Raspberry Pi fit into the whole picture? Is it used as an 'Internet of things' device to collect telemetry data?
- jackfoxy 12y ago
  Yes.

cflyingdutchman 12y ago

Jet.com is using F# as their core language. (and hiring) http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/16/quidsi-co-founder-raises-an-additional-20m-for-a-new-e-commerce-biz/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/16/quidsi-co-founder-raises-an...

curveship 12y ago

I've used it for parts of two commercial projects (not counting side projects). One was a small parser -- C#'s parser options were uninspiring while FParsec (based on Haskell's Parsec) was great. The other was to simulate a client-server algorithm we were developing under different network situations. F#'s ability to express algorithms concisely was a real win there. Side projects have mostly been stats/data based: using type providers to mash together different data sources, with visualization via FSharp.Charting.

MichaelGG 12y ago

I use it in telecom (VoIP). At peak, we were doing 1 billion calls a day. All routing decisions, F#. All call records, F# (on Mono). I've also used it in network indexing, processing 5TB of SIP signalling a day on a single server, then indexing and storing each packet for later searching. This is now used in the voice arm of a large public telco to provide troubleshooting. F# is a joy to work with and every time I use C# it's annoying.

FlyingSnake 12y ago
F# on Mono, that's great. Did you face any major roadblocks with Mono/F# in production?
- MichaelGG 12y ago
  No, honestly, the biggest issue was just remembering to install the F# libraries. Actually, the biggest issue is mono-service. Since we run cross platform, we used the Windows service API instead of writing a normal daemon. This has been a source of "random" issues with getting it to start. But that's just our fault for not changing 10 lines of code and just running it like every other Linux daemon. Similarly, some code depended on file locking (because FreeSWITCH's CDR writers don't properly write to files) which doesn't work on any popular Linux file systems. There are probably some other little issues where we made a dumb Windows only assumption. All in all, it's been smooth sailing. Stuff just works. We develop and test exclusively on Windows, then deploy the binaries to Linux. I can't say enough good things about F# and about Mono. Also, I don't use it on Linux, but F# Interactive would only work on some installs. A problem with readline iirc. I'd guess that developing on Linux will be more rocky than using Visual Studio.

sbrother 12y ago

I used it for an internal app that's getting used by several of the top global pharma companies to solve an optimization problem. I would choose F# again in heartbeat for that sort of project: its expressiveness let me implement the core algorithm in just a few hundred lines of fast, readable code, and its seamless interface with Microsoft-world allowed me to to embed it in a standard "Enterprise" stack (a C#/WPF desktop app as well as an ASP .NET webapp).