Definition of Haskell

Haskell a statistically and polymorphically statically typed computer programming language. It is purely functional and lazy in nature. The above mentioned characteristics make Haskell quite different from the other existing programming languages.

The language got its name from Haskell Brooks Curry. The work of Curry in the field of mathematical logic works as a foundation stone for the development of functional languages.

History of Developments of Haskell

The development of Haskell was initiated by a committee that was formed at the conference on Functional Programming Languages and Computer Architecture (FPCA ’87), which took place in Portland, Oregon. The participants of this conference agreed upon the point that a common standard shall be introduced for purely functional languages.

The basic purpose for the formation of this committee was to merge the existing functional languages into a united language, which would be treated as the corner stone for further research and development in the area of functional languages.

The primary version of Haskell, which was called Haskell 1.0, was introduced in the year 1990. The cumulative efforts and hard work of the committee afterwards led towards the development of a range of Haskell versions, namely 1.0, 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4.

The cessation of the Haskell series occurred in the 1997, which was accompanied with the development of Haskell 98. This development aimed at the introduction of a stable and portable version of the language along with a standard library for the purpose of future developments and teachings. The committee was open to the development of variants and extensions for Haskell 98. This was to be done through the introduction of experimental features in the language.

The Haskell 98 report formally and publically introduce the Haskell 98 language in the year 1999. This was accompanied by a range of developments and the introduction of Haskell 98 Language and Libraries: The Revised Report in January 2003. Since then the language has gone through a series of rapid developments. The present de facto standard is represented by the implementation of Glasgow Haskell Compiler (GHC).

The informal process of development of Haskell Prime during early 2006. This was to be defined as a successor to Haskell 98 standard. This process was intended to introduce a new revision in the definition of the language each year. Haskell 2010, which was the first formal revision, was published in 2010.

It has included a foreign function interface (FFI) in Haskell, eliminated some of the syntax issues, and banned the n plus k patterns. It has also included the extension, called Language-Pragma-Syntax, in the language.

Job profiles that require this skill