I’m interested in learning functional programming and would like to know where I might find low-cost programming tools to experiment with.
The comp.lang.functional FAQ describes functional programming this way: “Functional programming is a style of programming that emphasizes the evaluation of expressions, rather than execution of commands. The expressions in these languages are formed by using functions to combine basic values. A functional language is a language that supports and encourages programming in a functional style.”
Pointers to a number of different functional programming languages and tools are available in the FAQ. The language Haskell is a widely used functional programming language, with a variety of documentation and tools available for beginnings. Downloads available from the site www.haskell.org include Windows, Linux and Mac versions of the Hugs Haskell interpreter, which provides a Haskell programming environment, and support libraries and demonstration code. Links are provided for downloading the Glasgow Haskell Compiler, which can produce native executable programs that will run stand-alone. The site http://sequence.complete.org is home to the Haskell Weekly News, where you can find fairly sophisticated Haskell articles and sample code. Functional programming is used in many interesting complex modeling fields ranging from finance to manufacturing. It can be fun to learn a new way to look at and develop solutions for programming problems.
