patch-combinators-0.1: A library for patching functions and data structures

Data.Patch

Contents

Description

Patch combinators: A library for patching functions and data structures

A patch can be, for example

  • a type constraint (an identity function with a specific type)
  • a surjective function extending the domain of a function (e.g. turning a function on natural numbers into a function defined for any integer)

A typical use-case is to constrain the types of a QuickCheck property. Let's say we have a property to check associativity of addition:

 prop_addAssoc :: (Num a, Ord a) => a -> a -> a -> Bool
 prop_addAssoc a b c = (a + b) + c == a + (b + c)

In order to check that this property holds for Int8, we just say:

 *Data.Patch> quickCheck (prop_addAssoc -:: tI8 >-> id)

Note that we only had to give a partial type annotation since all arguments are required to have the same type.

Sometimes properties are only defined for a sub-set of the possible arguments. Consider the following property of enumFromTo:

 prop_enum m n = enumFromTo 0 m !! n == n

This property is only valid when m and n are natural numbers and n<=m. Instead of rewriting the property to account for arbitrary integers, we can simply apply a patch:

 quickCheck (prop_enum -:: name (\m -> abs >-> (min (abs m) . abs) >-> id))

Here name allows us to bind the first argument generated by QuickCheck. The patch uses abs to make sure that the values passed to the property are natural numbers, and min (abs m) to ensure that the second argument does not exceed the first.

The library has some similarities with Semantic editor combinators:

http://conal.net/blog/posts/semantic-editor-combinators

The main difference is that semantic editors are about locating and changing a small part of a data structure, while patches are about changing all parts of the structure. (For partial updates, use the id patch to leave sub-structures untouched.)

Synopsis

Patch combinators

type Patch a b = a -> bSource

(-::) :: a -> Patch a b -> bSource

Patch application

(>->) :: Patch c a -> Patch b d -> Patch (a -> b) (c -> d)Source

Function patch

The first patch is applied to the argument and the second patch to the result.

name :: (c -> Patch (a -> b) (c -> d)) -> Patch (a -> b) (c -> d)Source

A patch that depends on the first argument of the resuting function

tup2 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch (a1, a2) (b1, b2)Source

Pair patch (a specialized version of ***)

tup3 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch a3 b3 -> Patch (a1, a2, a3) (b1, b2, b3)Source

Analogous to tup2

tup4 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch a3 b3 -> Patch a4 b4 -> Patch (a1, a2, a3, a4) (b1, b2, b3, b4)Source

Analogous to tup2

tup5 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch a3 b3 -> Patch a4 b4 -> Patch a5 b5 -> Patch (a1, a2, a3, a4, a5) (b1, b2, b3, b4, b5)Source

Analogous to tup2

tup6 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch a3 b3 -> Patch a4 b4 -> Patch a5 b5 -> Patch a6 b6 -> Patch (a1, a2, a3, a4, a5, a6) (b1, b2, b3, b4, b5, b6)Source

Analogous to tup2

tup7 :: Patch a1 b1 -> Patch a2 b2 -> Patch a3 b3 -> Patch a4 b4 -> Patch a5 b5 -> Patch a6 b6 -> Patch a7 b7 -> Patch (a1, a2, a3, a4, a5, a6, a7) (b1, b2, b3, b4, b5, b6, b7)Source

Analogous to tup2

Type constraints

tCon :: Patch a a -> Patch (c a) (c a)Source

Type constructor