RE: [Caml-list] Please help a newbie

["Frank Atanassow" <franka@cs.uu.nl>]

> # let lys = ['a';'b';'c'];;
> val lys : char list = ['a'; 'b'; 'c']
> # let wys_dit woord = print_string woord;;
> val wys_dit : string -> unit = <fun>
> # let rec wys_die_lys l = function
>     [] -> []
>         | h :: t -> wys_dit h ::    wys_die_lys l t;;
> val wys_die_lys : 'a -> string list -> unit list = <fun>
> # wys_die_lys lys;;
> - : string list -> unit list = <fun>
> # wys_die_lys ['x','y','z'];;
> - : string list -> unit list = <fun>
> ------------------------------------------------
>
> Now my question:  I expected
>
> wys_die_lys lys to print out a b c
> and
> wys_die_lys ['x','y','z'] to print x y z
>
> Why did this not happen?

(Note: I only tested a few of the definitions that appear below. If I made a
mistake somewhere, hopefully you will not be too confused by it.)

As you can see from the reported type,

  wys_die_lys : 'a -> string list -> unit list

wys_die_lys is a "function of two arguments"; if you only pass it the first,
and the result is just another function, which expects a list of strings.
Also, the first argument of wys_die_lys, l, is never used (though it is
passed down recursively). You probably wanted to write:

  let rec wys_die_lys2 = function
      [] -> []
    | h :: t -> wys_dit h :: wys_die_lys2 t;;

You mentioned l on the lefthand side, and then used 'function' on the
righthand side. So the definition expects two arguments. Consider these
three definitions, which all define the same thing:

  let f x y = x+y;;
  let f x = function y -> x+y;;
  let f = function x -> function y -> x+y;;

Another problem is that the list you supply is a list of characters, but
wys_dit is expecting a string. So you should use the appropriate function
print_char:

  let wys_dit2 l = print_char l;;
  let rec wys_die_lys3 = function
      [] -> []
    | h :: t -> wys_dit2 h :: wys_die_lys3 t;;

Normally, you would have gotten a type error to alert you to this problem,
but because l is not used in wys_die_lys, it was assigned the type 'a, which
means you could pass a value of any type in for it. That makes sense,
because if you never use l, it does not matter what type of value it is
bound to.

But even if you use the definition above, it won't give the you result you
expect. Instead, you will get:

  # wys_die_lys3 ['x','y','z'];;
  zyx

The reason is that Ocaml evaluates function arguments from right to left.
The consing operator (::) is a function. Consequently, it will recurse down
the righthand side of the :: until it finds the empty list [], and then only
on its trip back will evaluate the lefthand side, wys_dit2 h.

A solution to this, then, is to use a let-expression, which evaluates the
expressions bound to let-variables before it evaluates the body.

  let rec wys_die_lys4 = function
      [] -> []
    | h :: t -> let x = wys_dit2 in
                x :: wys_die_lys4 t;;

This should work. It will return a list of units in every case, i.e.,
something of this form.

  [(); (); ... ()]

However, you are probably not interested in these sorts of results, so the
more conventional way to define something like this is to throw away the
result of wys_dit, and change the returned value in the first branch (the
base case) from [] to ().

  let rec wys_die_lys5 = function
      [] -> ()
    | h :: t -> let x = wys_dit2 h in
                wys_die_lys5 t;;

In these cases, x is never used (it's always the unit value ()), so you
probably want to use the sequencing operator ';' instead. So:

  let rec wys_die_lys6 = function
      [] -> ()
    | h :: t -> wys_dit2 h; wys_die_lys6 t;;

Lastly, there is no need to define wys_dit2; it does exactly the same thing
as print_char, so you can just write:

  let rec wys_die_lys7 = function
      [] -> ()
    | h :: t -> print_char h; wys_die_lys6 t;;

Incidentally, this definition would be more useful if you parametrized it
with a function doe_dit itself. That way you can perform some particular
action on every element of the list.

  let rec doe_met doe_dit = function
      [] -> ()
    | h :: t -> doe_dit h; doe_met doe_dit t;;

For example,

  doe_met print_char

is equal to the function wys_die_lys7. In fact, doe_met is already defined
in the List library, where it is called List.iter.

Hope that helped.

---
Frank Atanassow, Information & Computing Sciences, Utrecht University
Padualaan 14, PO Box 80.089, 3508TB Utrecht, The Netherlands
Tel +31 (0)30 253-3261 Fax +31 (0)30 251-3791

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