Top-level bindings in ghci
ghci now supports most of the declarations. However, it doesn't support the most basic and common type of declaraion — pattern and function bindings!
E.g.
Prelude> a = 1
<interactive>:2:3: parse error on input `='I realise that, if implemented, they would have somewhat different semantics than in Haskell modules — e.g. with respect to recursion.
But even if they behaved in the same way as top-level monadic let-bindings, they would still be very useful for two reasons:
- If you're doing quick experiments in ghci, "let a=1" is more than twice as long as "a=1", and that makes a difference.
- Novices are often confused when they are told that they have to use one syntax for definitions in modules and another in ghci.
Trac metadata
| Trac field | Value |
|---|---|
| Version | 7.6.1 |
| Type | FeatureRequest |
| TypeOfFailure | OtherFailure |
| Priority | normal |
| Resolution | Unresolved |
| Component | GHCi |
| Test case | |
| Differential revisions | |
| BlockedBy | |
| Related | |
| Blocking | |
| CC | |
| Operating system | |
| Architecture |