> simple tasks which are primarily IO This is primarily what I use functional languages for so far, so naturally I disagree. As long as their aren't stringent

> simple tasks which are primarily IO This is primarily what I use functional languages for so far, so naturally I disagree. As long as their aren't stringent performance requirements (though functional languages like Ocaml and Haskell are pretty fast) I find functional languages to be a generally better fit. Also parsing and string handling in C is worlds more difficult than something like Parsec using parser combinators.