David Fox reacts to my criticism of his attitude towards "the meaning of
folds":
I'm not trying to avoid learning the differences between the different
folds, but I am looking for a mnemonic device that will allow me to
proceed more quickly towards my goal. My ultimate goal is to write
software, not to understand folds. Just as it is inappropriate for a
young officer to even contemplate an overall strategy for winning the
war, it would be inappropriate for a general to spend more time than
necessary on the minute details of military tactics, as vital as they
are.
David, cynism or not, you might have found in my post some concrete
remarks, about incrementality, about tail-recursion... Not a single
comment of your part. No comment addressed to other people who tried
also to help you (whether we really help you in such a way is subject to
discussion...)
I am sorry, but saying that your goal is to write software is not even
funny. The relatively modern science of programming evolves for the last
60 years, and the progress in writing software NEVER came out of kitchen
recipes, on the contrary ! The laziness is not a "trick to avoid
computation", but a methodology of ordering the operations, and if you
are unable to order them in your head, you won't be able to exploit this
or that "design pattern".
OK, you gather some patterns, and you apply them. Once. And then, you
will be helpless, when the need for refactoring arrives. You will never
be able to teach those patterns to your younger colleagues. And finally,
your last remarks might be less relevant than you wish. A general gets
his stars usually after several years of demonstrating that he
UNDERSTANDS the minute details of military tactics, so he can
consciously choose those who will implement them.
Jerzy Karczmarczuk
_______________________________________________
Haskell-Cafe mailing list
[email protected]
http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
