[Haskell-cafe] ANNOUNCE: vector-bytestring-0.0.0.0

Wed Oct 19 13:09:05 CEST 2011

Conrad Parker wrote:
> On 15 October 2011 23:18, Ivan Lazar Miljenovic
> <ivan.miljenovic at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 16 October 2011 01:15, Bas van Dijk <v.dijk.bas at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I agree that you shouldn't use ByteStrings or Vectors of Word8s for
>>> Unicode strings. However I can imagine that for quick sessions in ghci
>>> it can be quite handy if they are shown as strings. For example,
>>> currently we have:
>>>
>>>> import Network.HTTP.Enumerator
>>>> simpleHttp "http://code.haskell.org/~basvandijk/"
>>> Chunk "<html>\n<head><title>Bas van
>>> Dijk</title></head>\n<body>\n<h1>Bas van Dijk</h1>\n\n<p>Email: <a
>>> href=\"mailto://v.dijk.bas@gmail.com\">v.dijk.bas at gmail.com</a></p>\n\n<p>Nick
>>> on IRC: <tt>basvandijk</tt></p>\n\n<a
>>> href=\"http://www.haskellers.com/user/basvandijk/\">\n  <img
>>> src=\"http://www.haskellers.com/static/badge.png\" \n       alt=\"I'm
>>> a Haskeller\"\n       border=\"0\">\n</a>\n\n<p>See my <a
>>> href=\"https://github.com/basvandijk\">GitHub</a> page for a list of
>>> projects I work on.</p>\n\n</body>\n</html>\n" Empty
>>>
>>> If ByteStrings were not shown as strings this would look like:
>>>
>>> Chunk ( fromList
>>> [60,104,116,109,108,62,10,60,104,101,97,100,62,60,116,105,116,108,101,62,66,97,115,32,118,97,110,32,68,105,106,107,60,47,116,105,116,108,101,62,60,47,104,101,97,100,62,10,60,98,111,100,121,62,10,60,104,49,62,66,97,115,32,118,97,110,32,68,105,106,107,60,47,104,49,62,10,10,60,112,62,69,109,97,105,108,58,32,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,109,97,105,108,116,111,58,47,47,118,46,100,105,106,107,46,98,97,115,64,103,109,97,105,108,46,99,111,109,34,62,118,46,100,105,106,107,46,98,97,115,64,103,109,97,105,108,46,99,111,109,60,47,97,62,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,112,62,78,105,99,107,32,111,110,32,73,82,67,58,32,60,116,116,62,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,60,47,116,116,62,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,104,116,116,112,58,47,47,119,119,119,46,104,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,115,46,99,111,109,47,117,115,101,114,47,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,47,34,62,10,32,32,60,105,109,103,32,115,114,99,61,34,104,116,116,112,58,47,47,119,119,119,46,104,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,115,46,99,111,109,47,115,116,97,116,105,99,47,98,97,100,103,101,46,112,110,103,34,32,10,32,32,32,32,32,32,32,97,108,116,61,34,73,39,109,32,97,32,72,97,115,107,101,108,108,101,114,34,10,32,32,32,32,32,32,32,98,111,114,100,101,114,61,34,48,34,62,10,60,47,97,62,10,10,60,112,62,83,101,101,32,109,121,32,60,97,32,104,114,101,102,61,34,104,116,116,112,115,58,47,47,103,105,116,104,117,98,46,99,111,109,47,98,97,115,118,97,110,100,105,106,107,34,62,71,105,116,72,117,98,60,47,97,62,32,112,97,103,101,32,102,111,114,32,97,32,108,105,115,116,32,111,102,32,112,114,111,106,101,99,116,115,32,73,32,119,111,114,107,32,111,110,46,60,47,112,62,10,10,60,47,98,111,100,121,62,10,60,47,104,116,109,108,62,10])
>>> Empty
>>>
>>> Personally, I don't work in ghci that often so I don't care that much
>>> if we have or don't have specialized Show instances for Vectors of
>>> Word8s.
>>>
>>> So what do other people think about this?
>>
>> Actually, for my current use case of Bytestrings (binary encoding of
>> graphs using existing encoding schemes), I would prefer this
>> [Word8]-based Show instance as it would help with my debugging, since
>> the output looks along the lines of: Chunk (fromList
>> [3,2,3,0,3,1,3,0,2,2,1,0]).  I am the first to admit that my use case
>> is probably different from others though.
>>
>
> And I often work with mixed text/binary data (eg. text annotations in
> video streams). I'd want the Show/Read instances to be in the form of
> a hexdump with char representation alongside (like xxd or od -xc
> output). It roundtrips well, so why not? :-)

So it seems that (1) people have very different requirements and (2) the
Show instance only really matters for debugging in ghci. Here is a
thought. What if ghci allowed Show instances to be overridden dynamically?
So you could put your preferred Show instance for Vector Word8 in you
.ghci file and ghci would use that when displaying stuff (but not when
actually evaluating things). Would that solve most of the problems without
messing with vector's Show instances?

Roman