Re: [Caml-list] If OCaml were a car

[Richard Jones <rich@annexia.org>]

On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 09:05:33AM +0100, David Allsopp wrote:
> (* first function *)
> let f x = (* definition of f *)
> in
>   let g x = (* definition of g *)
>   (* etc, etc *)
> 
> (* next function *)
> let h x = (* definition of *)
> 
> Here, O'Caml helpfully tells me that there's a syntax error on line 7 which
> is of course complete rubbish!! It may be easy to spot here, but I've
> absent-mindedly missed the final part of a bigger function mid-development

I find that using tuareg-mode (an Emacs mode for OCaml) generally
avoids this problem.

[...]
> I'd go one further - and recommend that all top level statements are
> function definitions (there's so rarely a need to use global "variables"...
> it usually comes back to bite you at some point later). Then define a

No I use top level "variables" all the time.  It depends what sort of
program you're writing, but for once-through command-line programs you
will often do things like:

let dbname = (* something involving Sys.argv *) ;;
let dbh = PGOCaml.connect ~dbname () ;;

Rich.

-- 
Richard Jones
Red Hat