Software Engineering Radio: Simon Peyton Jones on Functional Programming and Haskell

Podcast (MP3): Download

Hosts: Markus 

Guests:

Simon Peyton Jones

Recording venue:

QCon 2007

We start our discussion with a brief look at what Haskell is and how a pure functional language is different from non-pure languages. We then look at the basic building blocks and the philosophy of the language, discussing concepts such as the lambda calculus, closures, currying, immutability, lazy evaluation, memoization, and the role of data types in functional languages. A significant part of the discussion is then spent on the management of side effects in a pure language - in other words, the importance of monads. We conclude the episode with a look at Haskell's importance and community today.

• Haskell Community
• Haskell Cafe mailing list
• HOPL Paper on Haskell
• Book: Haskell, the craft of functional programming
• Book: Functional Programming in Haskel
• Book: Real-World Haskel