[Haskell-cafe] global variables

[Simon Peyton-Jones]

| >> and (at worst) are "evil". These people are quite simply wrong and
| >> should be ignored :-)
| >
| > Adrian Hey is not only wrong, but actually evil. He should be ignored. :-)
|
| I am right, I might well be evil, and if past experience is anything to
| go by I already know that I will be ignored. We've been talking about
| this problem for years, but nothing is ever done about it

I know that Jules preceded his remarks by saying that they were lighthearted, but I'd like to urge moderation in language.  One of the best things about the Haskell community is that politeness is pretty much universal.  Email is too fragile a medium to sustain the wry smile that can accompany an in-person conversation.

Also Adrian, you may feel ignored, but I don't think that's really so.  For example, I was looking back at your ACIO mail a couple of months ago, when I was thinking about concurrency.

Not immediately achieving a critical mass behind a language change is not the same as being ignored.  One of the good things about Haskell is that we put up with woefully inadequate situations (such as the total lack of sensible I/O in early lazy languages) because we can't yet find a solution that feels satisfying.  To say that "nothing is ever done about it" implies that there are clear things that could be done, but I don't think that is so (yet).  And sometimes people don't reply because they are just busy, or because they don't have anything useful to say.

In short, don't be discouraged.  Keep identifying problems, suggesting solutions, maintaining Wiki pages that summarise both, and so on.  There are lots of bright people on this mailing list, and sooner or later an "aha" moment will happen.

Simon