Re: Cognitive dissonance in the Haskell Report

"GHC doesn't need engage a lawyer"

On the other hand, once upon a time Haskell did employ a Syntax Czar.


[email protected] kirjoitti 8.11.2025 klo 4.11:
> Hehe, that language has just been copied forward from the 1998 Report, (and nobody's demurred in a quarter of a century AFAIK), so I think that horse has bolted.
>
> Interestingly, the 1992 Report (search for Version 1.2) doesn't use that language.
>
> I think 2.4's "ordinary identifier" is talking about the lexeme's semantic role: it identifies a function. (As distinct from a constructor, that can appear in a pattern match.) Elsewhere "ordinary operator" denotes its syntactic role.
>
> 3.2 continues after the bit you quote:
>
>      Dually, an operator symbol can be converted to an ordinary identifier by enclosing it in parentheses.
>
> But substituting (+) as an allegedly "ordinary identifier" into the para above would suggest (to those of an over-literal mind) that `(+)` should yield what is syntactically an operator again. Instead it gives syntax error.
>
> "ordinary" appears throughout the Report prefixed to all sorts of terms. I don't think you should take "ordinary identifier" as having a special technical sense. Note it doesn't appear anywhere in italics as a formal definiendum.
>
> And since taking the report over-literally will lead you quickly to a syntax error, I think GHC doesn't need engage a lawyer.
>
> AntC
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-- 
Matti Nykänen

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