[Haskell-cafe] Binary parser combinators and pretty printing

[Malcolm Wallace]

Einar Karttunen <ekarttun at cs.helsinki.fi> writes:

> I am trying to figure out the best interface to binary parser
> and pretty printing combinators for network protocols. 
> 
> 2) Using better combinators
> 
> packet = w32be <> w32be <> w32be <> lengthPrefixList w32be (lengthPrefixList w32be bytes)
> Has anyone used combinators like this before and how did it work?

Yes, the nhc98 Binary library has a "<<" combinator, in very much
the style you outline.  It is only used in pure code, but it permits
some very concise descriptions of the binary layout.  The library is
described here:

    ftp://ftp.cs.york.ac.uk/pub/malcolm/ismm98.html

but unfortunately that paper has only the tiniest examples of the
usage of "<<".  However, in my experience the style worked well and
was pleasant to use.

Regards,
    Malcolm