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Values and Types

The type of Booleans

True is a value in Haskell. Its type is Bool. In Haskell, we can state this as:

True :: Bool -- (1)!
  1. Read "X :: Y" as: "the value X has the type Y"
example :: Bool
example = True

Similarly, 

False :: Bool

Note

In Haskell, everything from simple values like True to complex programs have a unique type.

Tip

Haskell types can be quite complex. To understand a type, always ask: what do the values belonging to this type look like?

For example, the values belonging to Bool are True and False.

The type of integers

Int is a type for integers, as in:

5 :: Int
Gotcha

5 can have a more general type in Haskell. See here

The type of real numbers

There are several available options. A good general choice is Double:

5.0 :: Double

The type of text

Char is the type of single characters:

repl example
> :t 'a'
'a' :: Char

> :t 'b'
'b' :: Char

Text is the type of sequences of characters:

{-# LANGUAGE OverloadedStrings #-} --(1)!
import Data.Text (Text)

exampleText :: Text 
exampleText = "hello world!"
  1. See here for why this extension is needed.

The type of functions

A function in Haskell means the same as a function in mathematics: it takes an input and produces an output. The type of the function depends on the type of the input and the type of the output. 

(\x -> x > 3) :: (Int -> Bool)

exampleFunction = (\x -> x > 3) :: (Int -> Bool)

Note

In Python, this would be written: lambda x: x > 3

We can also define functions without the lambda syntax, like so:

exampleFunction :: Int -> Bool
exampleFunction x = x > 3

!! Note Int and Bool here are parameters of the type Int -> Bool. One can obtain a different type by changing these parameters, e.g. Text -> Int.

Product types (tuples)

Pairs of values are themselves values. For example (True, False) has type (Bool, Bool):

(True, False) :: (Bool, Bool)

Note

(Bool, Bool) is a type defined in terms of another type, Bool. We could change either the left-hand or right-hand type, to get new types, like:

  • (Bool, Int)
  • (Int, Bool)
  • ((Bool, Int), Bool)

Sum types

If you have two types, say Bool and Int, then you can generate a new type which is their disjoint union, called Either Bool Int. 

(Left True) :: Either Bool Int -- (1)!
(Left False) :: Either Bool Int 
(Right 3) :: Either Bool Int -- (2)!
(Right 7) :: Either Bool Int

  1. Left is a function which takes True as an argument. In other languages, this might be written Left(True)

  2. Right is a function which takes 3 as an argument. In other languages, this might be written Right(3)

Note

Left and Right are functions. 

Left :: Bool -> Either Bool Int --(1)!
Right :: Int -> Either Bool Int
  1. Actually, the type is more general: forall a. a -> Either a Int. See the section on universally quantified types.

Maybe

A closely related type is Maybe, which in other languages is sometimes called Optional:

Some values and their types
Just True :: Maybe Bool -- (1)!
Just 5 :: Maybe Int
Nothing :: Maybe Bool
-- Also true:
Nothing :: Maybe Int -- (2)!

  1. Just is a function of type Bool -> Maybe Bool.

  2. The most general type of Nothing is forall a. Maybe a: see the section on Universal types.

The unit type

The type () contains a single value, which is also written ().

Note

Conceptually, Maybe X is the same as Either () X (for any type X).

Warning

This practice of writing a type and a value with the same symbol is known as punning, and is quite widespread in Haskell. Be sure, when reading () :: (), to understand that the () on the left is a value and the () on the right is a type.

The empty type

Void is the type with no values. It can be useful (mostly as a building block for more complex types), but at an introductory level is fairly rare. 

example :: Void
example = ??? -- (1)!
  1. Nothing can go here except something like undefined, which throws a runtime error.

The list type

The type of a list of Bools is written [Bool] or [] Bool.

The type of a list of Ints is written [Int] or [] Int.

More generally, for any type a, [a] is the type of lists of values of type a.

Gotcha

Lists are homogeneous: all elements must have the same type.

Write a list as in Python, like [True, False, True]. : is an operator to append to the front of a list. Examples:

repl example
> 4 : [3, 1]
[4, 3, 1]
> 4 : []
[4]
> [1..10]
[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]

Note

[1,2,3] is just convenient syntax for 1 : (2 : (3 : [])).

The IO type

The type IO Bool describes a process which can do arbitrary I/O, such as reading and writing to files, starting threads, running shell scripts, etc. The Bool indicates that a result of running this process will be to produce a value of type Bool. More generally, for any type a, IO a runs a process and returns a value of type a.

An example:

repl example
import qualified Data.Text.IO as T
> :t getLine
T.getLine :: IO T.Text

If run, this will read a line from StdIn and this line will be the value of type Text that is produced.

The top level function in a Haskell project is often:

main :: IO ()
main = ...

Universal types

Here is an example of polymorphism, or universal quantification over types:

swap :: (a, b) -> (b, a)
swap (x, y) = (y, x)

swap :: forall a b . (a, b) -> (b, a) -- (1)!
swap (x, y) = (y, x)
  1. You'll need the extension ExplicitForAll to enable this.

Read this type as saying: for any type a, and any type b, this function will take a pair of values, one of type a on the left, and one of type b on the right, and give back a pair in the other order.

Specific types are always uppercase, but a variable ranging over types like a and b above are always lowercase.

Note

"any type" really means any type. That includes Bool, Int, Text, [Bool], [(Bool, Int)], functions like (Int -> Bool) or (Int -> Int) -> Bool, custom types you defined (e.g. ChessPiece), Either Bool [Int], IO Int, and so on.

Tip

Universally quantified types are not like Any in Python. For example, the Boolean negation function not :: Bool -> Bool does not also have the type a -> a.

In forall a. (a, b) -> (b, a), both occurrences of a must be the same, and both occurrences of b must be the same. so (Bool, Int) -> (Int, Bool) or (Text, Double) -> (Double, Text), but not (Bool, Int) -> (Double, Text).

For this reason, the only function that has type forall a. a -> a is the identity function (written id), because that is the only operation you can be sure works for every input type.

And no function has the type forall a b. a -> b, because that function would need to be able to take an input of any type, and return an output of any type.

How to use

If you have a function with a universally quantified type as input, you can always call it on any particular types. For example:

repl example
> let swap (a,b) = (b,a)
> swap (4, True)
(True,4)
> swap ('a', 3)
(3,'a')

If you have a non-function value of a universally quantified type, like undefined :: forall a . a , you may use it as the argument to any function (although actually running the code will throw an error if undefined is evaluated.)

repl example
> :t not
not :: Bool -> Bool
> :t not undefined
not undefined :: Bool

Usage with parametrized types

Universally quantified types can appear as the parameters of other types:

getLeft :: Either a b -> Maybe a
getLeft (Left x) = Just x
getLeft (Right _) = Nothing

getLeft :: forall a b. Either a b -> Maybe a
getLeft (Left x) = Just x
getLeft (Right _) = Nothing

The universally quantified a and b indicate that getLeft is only manipulating the structure of the input, but nothing more. For example, if a function like not was called on x, then a could no longer be universally quantified:

getLeft :: Either Bool b -> Maybe Bool
getLeft (Left x) = Just (not x)
getLeft (Right _) = Nothing

Types for types

Types themselves have types, sometimes known as kinds.

repl example
> :kind Bool
Bool :: * -- (1)!
> :kind Int
Int :: *
> :kind (Either Bool Int)
Either Bool Int :: *


> :k Either
Either :: * -> (* -> *) -- (2)! 
> :k (Either Bool)
Either Bool :: (* -> *) 
> :k (Either Int)
Either Int :: (* -> *) 

> :k [Bool]
[Bool] :: *
> :k (Bool, Int)
(Bool, Int) :: *

> :k []
[] :: * -> *
  1. * is the kind for all types that can have values, like Bool, Either Bool Int, [Bool] and so on.
  2. Consult this section if this is unclear. Note also that it will be displayed: * -> * -> * by the repl.

Note

The ability to have types of "higher kinds" (i.e. kinds like * -> *, or * -> * -> *) is a central feature that makes Haskell's type system more sophisticated than many languages.

In codebases, it is common to encounter types like ReaderT which has kind * -> (* -> *) -> * -> * or Fix, which has kind (* -> *) -> *

Universal quantification for other kinds than *

Tip

Make sure to use the GHC2021 extension or add the language extensions recommended by Haskell Language Server for this section.

In a universally quantified type like forall a. a, we can explicitly specify the kind of types that the quantifier forall ranges over:

swap :: forall (a :: *) (b :: *) . (a, b) -> (b, a)
swap (x, y) = (y, x)

The kind does not need to be *. For example, here is the type of fmap (see this section about typeclasses):

fmap ::forall (f :: * -> *) (a::*) (b::*). Functor f => (a -> b) -> (f a -> f b)

fmap :: Functor f => (a -> b) -> f a -> f b
Last update: February 14, 2023
Created: January 7, 2023

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