MbShea@PWP@English@UMCP

Abstract: I recently finished up learning Haskell in CMSC498V and found it to be a largely rewarding experience. Haskell is a thought-provoking language often used as a proving ground for new ideas in the Computer Science realm. As such, the language itself is geared towards it’s existing users, like most other languages. However, a language geared towards researchers with postsecondary degrees is unlikely to appeal undergraduate students, programming hobbyists, or professional software developers. The lack of diverse community support has left Haskell feeling rough around the edges, without the same level of development in supporting libraries, quality of life tools, or workflows as with other more popular languages (i.e. Python). The Haskell community is looking to improve the situation and is looking to solicit feedback from newcomers to the language to see what they improve. This experience report serves two purposes: 1) to give the Haskell community an idea of where I think the language could improve 2) to serve as a lessons learned retrospective to any other Haskell newcomers.

WC: 170

Reader Profile: Reader with a strong background in Haskell who believes the most understanding comes through struggling with the concepts.

Reader’s Response: While I think the aim of this post is admirable, I think that your efforts would have been better used on focusing on where you found issue with Haskell. There is a litany of material that serves as a thorough and acceptable introduction to the language, some of which you used yourself. The difficulties you may have had in understanding the language are purposeful as Haskell is a language meant to challenge and expand your frame of thinking. While analogies are always a good jumping off point for getting into the nuances of the language and category theory, the ones you used weren’t entirely correct and I could see them being misleading to some. Now on the topic of the language feedback you gave, most of it seemed like it was already on the docket for the upcoming Haskell2020 revision or didn’t have enough depth and use cases to merit more serious discussion. I think if you gain more experience with the language you’ll be able to generate some more poignant feedback that we’d be excited to hear! Cheers :)!

Voice: Same throughout
Citation: APA, same throughout

B, very interesting approach to this small programming corner of the coding world. Is this a gentle manifesto? Would you see this posted within the H community or on GitHub?

You might address this reader by admitting that you are new to Haskell but offer this perspective about how to widen the Haskell community of users. Newbie perspectives, introduced with a bit of humility, can be good food for thought.

What do you mean by diversity? Touch base with me about this word choice and your intended meaning.