iterate function in haskell - function

How can be iterate function modified that the result will be
f x, (f^2)x, (f^4)x, (f^8)x, ...
I'd be very happy if anybody could provide me with any suggestion.

Given, that f^x means f x-times applied to x I would say
iterate :: (a -> a) -> a -> [a]
iterate f x = f x : iterate (f . f) x
would suffice.

Alternative:
Prelude> map snd $ iterate (\(f,x) -> (f.f, f x)) ((+1),1)
[1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192,...

Related

Explanation of map functions (using foldr) in Haskell?

I'm trying to define the map function using foldr
I have found the two following solutions, however I'm not quite sure how they are working.
map' :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map' f = foldr ((:) . f) []
map'' :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map'' f = foldr (\x xs -> f x : xs) []
I'm quite new to Haskell and foldr, so I'm struggling to understand what ((:) . f) in the first solution and what (\x xs -> f x : xs) in the second solution do.
I also don't get how foldr is able handle the empty list case.
It would be much appreciated if I could get a simple step by step explanation of this, in layman's terms.
Both (\x xs -> f x : xs) and (:) . f mean the same thing. They're both functions that take two arguments, apply f to the first argument, and then cons that onto the second argument.
So what does foldr do when given an empty list? It simply returns the starting value, which in these examples is [].
Here is the implementation of foldr from Hackage:
foldr k z = go
where
go [] = z
go (y:ys) = y `k` go ys

Is there a specific type for mathematical functions in Haskell?

I want to write a function that takes a mathematical function (/,x,+,-), a number to start with and a list of numbers. Then, it's supposed to give back a list.
The first element is the starting number, the second element the value of the starting number plus/minus/times/divided by the first number of the given list. The third element is the result of the previous result plus/minus/times/divided by the second result of the given list, and so on.
I've gotten everything to work if I tell the code which function to use but if I want to let the user input the mathematical function he wants, there are problems with the types. Trying :t (/) for example gives out Fractional a => a -> a -> a, but if you put that at the start of your types, it fails.
Is there a specific type to distinguish these functions (/,x,+,-)? Or is there another way to write this function succesfully?
prefix :: (Fractional a, Num a) => a -> a -> a -> a -> [a] -> [a]
prefix (f) a b = [a] ++ prefix' (f) a b
prefix' :: (Fractional a, Num a) => a -> a -> a -> a -> [a] -> [a]
prefix' (z) x [] = []
prefix' (z) x y = [x z (head y)] ++ prefix' (z) (head (prefix' (z) x y)) (tail y)
A right solution would be something like this:
prefix (-) 0 [1..5]
[0,-1,-3,-6,-10,-15]
Is there a specific type to distinguish these functions (/,*,+,-)?
I don't see a reason to do this. Why is \x y -> x+y considered "better" than \x y -> x + y + 1. Sure adding two numbers is something that most will consider more "pure". But it is strange to restrict yourself to a specific subset of functions. It is also possible that for some function \x y -> f x y - 1 "happens" to be equal to (+), except that the compiler can not determine that.
The type checking will make sure that one can not pass functions that operate on numbers, given the list contains strings, etc. But deliberately restricting this further is not very useful. Why would you prevent programmers to use your function for different purposes?
Or is there another way to write this function succesfully?
What you here describe is the scanl :: (b -> a -> b) -> b -> [a] -> [b] function. If we call scanl with scanl f z [x1, x2, ..., xn], then we obtain a list [z, f z x1, f (f z x1) x2, ...]. scanl can be defined as:
scanl :: (b -> a -> b) -> b -> [a] -> [b]
scanl f = go
where go z [] = [z]
go z (x:xs) = z : go (f z x) xs
We thus first emit the accumulator (that starts with the initial value), and then "update" the accumulator to f z x with z the old accumulator, and x the head of the list, and recurse on the tail of the list.
If you want to restrict to these four operations, just define the type yourself:
data ArithOp = Plus | Minus | Times | Div
as_fun Plus = (+)
as_fun Minus = (-)
as_fun Times = (*)
as_fun Div = (/)

Replacing functions in composite function in haskell

I'm trying to become familiar with Haskell and I was wondering if the following was possible and if so, how?
Say I have a set of functions {f,g,..} for which I was to define a replacement function {f',g',..}. Now say I have a function c which uses these functions (and only these functions) inside itself e.g. c x = g (f x). Is there a way to automatically define c' x = g' (f' x) without explicitly defining it?
EDIT: By a replacement function f' I mean some function that is conceptually relates to f by is altered in some arbitrary way. For example, if f xs ys = (*) <$> xs <*> ys then f' (x:xs) (y:ys) = (x * y):(f' xs ys) etc.
Many thanks,
Ben
If, as seems to be the case with your example, f and f' have the same type etc., then you can easily pass them in as extra parameters. Like
cGen :: ([a] -> [a] -> [a]) -> (([a] -> [a]) -> b) -> [a] -> b
cGen f g x = g (f x)
...which BTW could also be written cGen = (.)...
If you want to group together specific “sets of functions”, you can do that with a “configuration type”
data CConfig a b = CConfig {
f :: [a] -> [a] -> [a]
, g :: ([a] -> [a]) -> b
}
cGen :: CConfig a b -> [a] -> b
cGen (CConfig f g) = f . g
The most concise and reliable way to do something like this would be with RecordWildCards
data Replacer ... = R {f :: ..., g :: ...}
c R{..} x = g (f x)
Your set of functions now is now pulled from the local scope from the record, rather than a global definition, and can be swapped out for a different set of functions at your discretion.
The only way to get closer to what you want would to be to use Template Haskell to parse the source and modify it. Regular Haskell code simply cannot inspect a function in any way - that would violate referential transparency.

Haskell parentheses for function application binding

I'm learning Haskell. I defined the following function (I know I don't need addToList and I can also do Point-free notation I'm just in the process of playing with language concepts):
map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map f [] = []
map f (x:xs) = addToList (f x) map f xs
where
addToList :: a -> [a] -> [a]
addToList x [] = [x]
addToList x xs = x:xs
This produces a compile error:
with actual type `(a0 -> b0) -> [a0] -> [b0]'
Relevant bindings include
f :: a -> b (bound at PlayGround.hs:12:5)
map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b] (bound at PlayGround.hs:11:1)
Probable cause: `map' is applied to too few arguments
In the second argument of `addToList', namely `map'
In the expression: addToList (f x) map f xs
If I put parantheses around map it works:
map :: (a -> b) -> [a] -> [b]
map f [] = []
map f (x:xs) = addToList (f x) (map f xs)
where
addToList :: a -> [a] -> [a]
addToList x [] = [x]
addToList x xs = x:xs
I understand that function application binds more tightly than operators (as discussed in Haskell - too few arguments), however, I don't understand how the compiler would parse the above differently without the parantheses.
The simple way to see that something is wrong is to note that the expression:
addToList (f x) map f xs
is applying 4 arguments to addToList whereas:
addToList (f x) (map f xs)
is applying two arguments to addToList (which is what addToList "expects").
Update
Note that even though map takes two arguments, this expression:
addToList a map c d
is parsed as:
(((addToList a) map) c) d
So here's a possible explanation of what GHC is thinking...
addToList (f x) has type [a] -> [a] - i.e. it is a function which takes a list.
map has type (c -> d) -> [c] -> [d]. It is not a list, but with additional arguments it could produce a list.
So when GHC sees addTolist (f x) map and can't type check it, it sees that if map only had a few more arguments, like this:
addToList (f x) (map ...)
at least the second argument to addToList would be a list - so perhaps that's the problem.
Parsing is a distinct step that is completed before type checking occurs. The expression
addToList (f x) map f xs
has as much meaning to the parser as s1 (s2 s3) s4 s2 s5 has to you. It doesn't know anything about what the names mean. It takes the lexical structure of the string and turns it into a parse tree like
*5
/ \
/ xs
*4
/ \
/ f
*3
/ \
/ map
*2
/ \
addToList *1
/ \
f x
Once the parse tree is complete, then each node is tagged with its type, and type checking can occur. Since function application is denoted simply by juxtaposition, the type checker knows that the left child of a node is a function, the right child is the argument, and the root is the result.
The type checker can proceed roughly as follows, doing an pre-order traversal of the tree. (I'll alter the type signatures slightly to distinguish unrelated type variables until they are unified.)
addToList :: a -> [a] -> [a], so it takes an argument of type a and returns a function of type [a] -> [a]. The value of a is not yet known.
f :: b -> c, so it takes an argument of type b and returns a value of type c. The values of b and c are not yet known.
x has type d. The value of d is not yet known.
Letting b ~ d, f can be applied to x, so *1 :: c
Letting a ~ c, addToList is applied to *1, so *2 :: [a] -> [a]
Uh oh. *2 expects an argument of type [a], but it is being applied to map :: (e -> f) -> [e] -> [f]. The type checker does not know how to unify a list type and a function type, which produces the error you see.

Haskell too many arguments error

I am learning Haskell. I am trying to make a function that deletes integers out of a list when met with the parameters of a certain function f.
deleteif :: [Int] -> (Int -> Bool) -> [Int]
deleteif x f = if x == []
then []
else if head x == f
then deleteif((tail x) f)
else [head x] ++ deleteif((tail x) f)
I get the following errors :
function tail is applied to two arguments
'deleteif' is applied to too few arguments
The issue is that you don't use parentheses to call a function in Haskell. So you just need to use
if f (head x)
then deleteif (tail x) f
else [head x] ++ deleteif (tail x) f
the problem is in deleteif((tail x) f)
it becomes deleteif (tail x f)
so tail gets 2 arguments
and then deleteif a
so deleteif gets 1 argument
you want deleteif (tail x) f
head x == f is wrong you want `f (head x)
you can use pattern matching ,guards and make it more generic
deleteif :: [a] -> (a -> Bool) -> [a]
deleteif [] _ = []
deleteif (x:xs) f
| f x = deleteif xs f
| otherwise = x : deleteif xs f
As already said, deleteif((tail x) f) is parsed as deleteif (tail x f), which means tail is applied to the two arguments x and f, and the result would then be passed on as the single argument to deleteif. What you want is deleteif (tail x) f, which is equivalent to (deleteif (tail x)) f and what most languages1 would write deleteif(tail x, f).
This parsing order may seem confusing initially, but it turns out to be really useful in practice. The general name for the technique is Currying.
For one thing, it allows you to write dense statements without needing many parentheses – in fact deleteif (tail x f) could also be written deleteif $ tail x f.
More importantly, because the arguments don't need to be “encased” in a single tuple, you don't need to supply them all at once but automatically get partial application when you apply to only one argument. For instance, you could use this function like that: deleteif (>4) [1,3,7,5,2,9,7] to yield [7,5,9,7]. This works by partially applying the function2 > to 4, leaving a single-argument function which can be used to filter the list.
1Indeed, this style is possible in Haskell as well: just write the signatures of such multi-argument functions as deleteif :: ([Int], Int->Bool) -> [Int]. Or write uncurry deleteif (tail x, f). But it's definitely better you get used to the curried style!
2Actually, > is an infix which behaves a bit different – you can partially apply it to either side, i.e. you can also write deleteif (4>) [1,3,7,5,2,9,7] to get [1,3,2].