Learn a functional programming language.

So I did learn a bit of Haskell, but it got to a screeching halt when I got to the type system. It really is terribly complicated. I am therefore back on Scheme, which I feel I’m slowly starting to get the hang of now.

I feel like Scheme is closer to the theory, having essentially nothing but s-expressions and lambdas. Of course it’s rubbish, Haskell is pure, Scheme is not and as soon as I get the hang of Scheme I will move over to Haskell and take another round with that type system.

... and so I choose Haskell as my functional language. I’ve started reading the “Yet Another Haskell Tutorial” and realise that Haskell makes it easier to understand functional programming. It’s a lovely language. I plan to learn a little Scheme in parallel as well, because, well it’s a lisp dialect and you have to know some lisp as well. But Haskell is way more fun.

ive learned html, javascript, flash, C, and C++

Ah, can’t really program in a functional language without knowing lambda calculus. So I’m learning lambda calculus.
n
I borrowed Chris Hankins book “An Introduction to Lambda Calculi for Computer Scientists” from my friend Tobias Wrigstad (the one we’ve been trying to encourage to go to Holland and work with supercooldave). I must say I don’t like it that much. It’s very terse, which is good, but unfortunately often too terse. Also, I have no idea why he calls it ”... for Computer Scientists”. So far, I’ve only found two program examples, and they have been less relevant Java examples.

Anyone got a better book on lambda calculus for someone that is more of a programmer than a mathematician?

... and ended up trying to understand the intricacies of lambda calculus and reading the lambda papers, which is even more fun. I’ve even had some “aha” – moments but there’s still a lot I don’t get. Looks like I’m going to have to implement Scheme in order to understand it.

I just don’t know which one. Lisp is classic, but … well it’s all those parentheses.