#r "RProvider.dll"
open RProvider
open RProvider.``base``
let add (x: float) (y: float) =
let sum = R.sum(x,y)
sum.Value
VS gives me the error "The field, constructor or member 'Value' is not defined"
I also tried passing a vector to R.sum
from the little existing documentation (https://github.com/BlueMountainCapital/FSharpRProvider/wiki/How-To) I can't figure what to do
The R.sum function seems to be a bit uglier to use, because it takes variable number of parameters and sums all of them (so the R type provider cannot infer what arguments it expects).
To get the result back, you'll need some extension methods:
open RDotNet
There are two options for calling such function - you can just give it the arguments (without specifying their names), which works well enough for R.sum:
// You can pass parameters as an explicit array
R.sum([| 2.0; 3.0 |]).AsNumeric() |> Seq.head
// Or you can use the fact that the function takes 'params' array
R.sum(1.0, 2.0).AsNumeric() |> Seq.head
If you want to specify the name of the parameters (not really needed here, but useful for other function), then you can build a structure representing "named parameters" for an R function and call it:
let nums = namedParams ["x", 2.0; "y", 3.0]
R.sum(nums).AsNumeric() |> Seq.head
Note that the situation is nicer for functions where the parameters can be statically inferred. E.g.:
R.mean(x=[1;2;3])
Related
I want to parse and compile a function that I have written at runtime, for example I have the following string I generated at runtime:
let str = "fun x y z -> [x; y; z;]"
I am looking for something that will allow me to do something similar to:
let myfun = eval str
(* eval returns the value returned by the code in the string so myfun will
have the type: 'a -> 'a -> 'a -> 'a list*)
Is there a way to do that in OCaml? I came across Dynlink but I am looking for a simpler way to do it.
There is no easier solution than compiling the code and Dynlinking the resulting library.
Or equivalently, one can use the REPL, write the string to the file system and them load it with #use.
Depending on your precise use case, MetaOCaml might be an alternative.
Another important point is that types cannot depend on values in a non-dependently typed language. Thus the type of eval needs to be restricted. For instance, in the Dynlinking path, the type of dynamically linked functions will be determined by the type of the hooks used to register them.
I saw this example in the Julia language documentation. It uses something called Base. What is this Base?
immutable Squares
count::Int
end
Base.start(::Squares) = 1
Base.next(S::Squares, state) = (state*state, state+1)
Base.done(S::Squares, s) = s > S.count;
Base.eltype(::Type{Squares}) = Int # Note that this is defined for the type
Base.length(S::Squares) = S.count;
Base is a module which defines many of the functions, types and macros used in the Julia language. You can view the files for everything it contains here or call whos(Base) to print a list.
In fact, these functions and types (which include things like sum and Int) are so fundamental to the language that they are included in Julia's top-level scope by default.
This means that we can just use sum instead of Base.sum every time we want to use that particular function. Both names refer to the same thing:
Julia> sum === Base.sum
true
Julia> #which sum # show where the name is defined
Base
So why, you might ask, is it necessary is write things like Base.start instead of simply start?
The point is that start is just a name. We are free to rebind names in the top-level scope to anything we like. For instance start = 0 will rebind the name 'start' to the integer 0 (so that it no longer refers to Base.start).
Concentrating now on the specific example in docs, if we simply wrote start(::Squares) = 1, then we find that we have created a new function with 1 method:
Julia> start
start (generic function with 1 method)
But Julia's iterator interface (invoked using the for loop) requires us to add the new method to Base.start! We haven't done this and so we get an error if we try to iterate:
julia> for i in Squares(7)
println(i)
end
ERROR: MethodError: no method matching start(::Squares)
By updating the Base.start function instead by writing Base.start(::Squares) = 1, the iterator interface can use the method for the Squares type and iteration will work as we expect (as long as Base.done and Base.next are also extended for this type).
I'll grant that for something so fundamental, the explanation is buried a bit far down in the documentation, but http://docs.julialang.org/en/release-0.4/manual/modules/#standard-modules describes this:
There are three important standard modules: Main, Core, and Base.
Base is the standard library (the contents of base/). All modules
implicitly contain using Base, since this is needed in the vast
majority of cases.
Suppose I have to update a list with each call to a function, such that, the previous element of the list are preserved.
Here is my attempt:
local
val all_list = [];
in
fun insert (x:int) : string = int2string (list_len( ((all_list#[x])) ) )
end;
The problem is that each time I call to insert, I get the output "1", which indicates that the list is initiated to [] again.
However I was expecting output of "1" for the first call to insert, and "2" for the second call,...etc.
I am not able to come with a workaround. How should it be done?
You need to use side-effects.
Most of the time functional programmers prefer to use pure functions, which don't have side effects. Your implementation is a pure function, so it will always return the same value for the same input (and in your case it returns the same value for any input).
You can deal with that by using a reference.
A crash course on references in Standard ML:
use ref to create a new reference, ref has type 'a -> 'a ref, so it packs an arbitrary value into a reference cell, which you can modify later;
! is for unpacking a reference: (!) : 'a ref -> 'a, in most imperative languages this operation is implicit, but not in SML or OCaml;
(:=) : 'a ref * 'a -> unit is an infix operator used for modifying references, here is how you increment the contents of an integer reference: r := !r + 1.
The above gives us the following code (I prepend xs onto the list, instead of appending them):
local
val rxs = ref []
in
fun insert (x:int) : string =
(rxs := x :: !rxs;
Int.toString (length (!rxs)))
end
Values are immutable in SML. insert is defined in a context in which the value of all_list is [] and nothing about your code changes that value.
all_list#[x]
doesn't mutate the value all_list -- it returns a brand new list, one which your code promptly discards (after taking its length).
Using reference types (one of SML's impure features) it is possible to do what you seem to be trying to do, but the resulting code wouldn't be idiomatic SML. It would break referential transparency (the desirable feature of functional programming languages where a function called with identical inputs yields identical outputs).
I have code:
let join a ~with':b ~by:key =
let rec a' = link a ~to':b' ~by:key
and b' = link b ~to':a' ~by:(Key.opposite key) in
a'
and compilation result for it is:
Error: This kind of expression is not allowed as right-hand side of
`let rec' build complete
I can rewrite it to:
let join a ~with':b ~by:key =
let rec a'() = link a ~to':(b'()) ~by:key
and b'() = link b ~to':(a'()) ~by:(Key.opposite key) in
a'()
It is compilable variant, but implemented function is infinitely recursive and it is not what I need.
My questions: Why is first implementation invalid? How to call two functions and use their results as arguments for each other?
My compiler version = 4.01.0
The answer to your first question is given in Section 7.3 of the OCaml manual. Here's what it says:
Informally, the class of accepted definitions consists of those definitions where the defined names occur only inside function bodies or as argument to a data constructor.
Your names appear as function arguments, which isn't supported.
I suspect the reason is that you can't assign a semantics otherwise. It seems to me the infinite computation that you see is impossible to avoid in general.
using let inline and member constraints I'll be able to make duck typing for known members but what if I would like to define a generic function like so:
let duckwrapper<'a> duck = ...
with the signature 'b -> 'a and where the returned value would be an object that implemented 'a (which would be an interface) and forwarded the calls to duck.
I've done this in C# using Reflection.Emit but I'm wondering if F# reflection, quotations or other constructs would make it easier.
Any suggestions on how to accomplish this?
EDIT
after reading Tims answer I thought I'd give a bit more details
What I was thinking of when I wrote about using quotations to help was something like:
{new IInterface with member x.SayHello() = !!<# %expr #>}
!! being an operator translating the quotation to a function and %expr being the unit of work for the method. I'd be able to translate the expression to a function (I guess) but wouldn't know how to
of course this wouldn't do the trick completely either since IInterface would be 'a which is where I hope F# reflection might have some handy functions so that I could construct a type based on a type object and some function values
EDIT
As an update to Tomas Petricek answer I'll give some code to explain my needs
type SourceRole =
abstract transfer : decimal -> context
and context(sourceAccount:account, destinationAccount) =
let source = sourceAccount
let destination = destinationAccount
member self.transfer amount =
let sourcePlayer =
{new SourceRole with
member this.transfer amount =
use scope = new TransactionScope()
let source = source.decreaseBalance amount
let destination = destination.increaseBalance amount
scope.Complete()
context(source,destination)
}
sourcePlayer.transfer(amount)
which is a try at porting "the" textbook example of DCI in F#. The source and destination are DCI roles. It's the idea that any data object that adhere's to a specific contract can play those. In this case the contract is simple. source needs a memberfunction called decreaseBalance and destination needs a member function called increaseBalance.
I can accomplish that for this specific case with let inline and member constraints.
But I'd like to write a set of functions that given an interface and an object. In this case it could be source (as the object) and
type sourceContract =
abstract decreaseBalance : decimal -> sourceContract
as the type. The result would be an object of type sourceContract that would pipe method calls to a method with the same name on the source object.
F# reflection (Microsoft.FSharp.Reflection) is an F#-friendly wrapper around the plain System.Reflection APIs, so I don't think it would add anything here.
Quotations can't define new types: (you'd need to define a new type to do your interface-based duck typing)
> <# { new IInterface with member x.SayHello = "hello" } #>;;
<# { new IInterface with member x.SayHello = "hello" } #>;;
---^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
stdin(7,4): error FS0449: Quotations cannot contain object expressions
> <# type Test() = class end #>;;
<# type Test() = class end #>;;
---^^^^
stdin(8,4): error FS0010: Unexpected keyword 'type' in quotation literal
Reflection.Emit is still the way to go with this.
Edit:
I hope F# reflection might have some handy functions so that I could construct a type based on a type object and some function values
I'm afraid it doesn't. Here's the documentation on F# reflection: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/ee353491.aspx
You can compile F# quotations using components from F# PowerPack. So I think you could use quotations to generate and execute code at runtime. If you write a quotation representing a function & compile it you'll get a function value that you could use to implement an interface. Here is a trivial example:
#r "FSharp.PowerPack.Linq.dll"
open Microsoft.FSharp.Quotations
open Microsoft.FSharp.Linq.QuotationEvaluation
// Create a part using "Expr." calls explicitly
let expr = Expr.Value(13)
// Create a part using quotation syntax
let expr2 = <# (fun x -> x * %%expr) #>
// Compile & Run
let f = expr2.Compile()()
f 10
You can mix quotation syntax and calls to Expr, which makes it easier to compose code from basic blocks. The compilation is a bit stupid (currently) so the generated code won't be as efficient as usual F# code (but you'll need to measure it in your case).
I'm not quite sure I understand what exactly are you trying to do, so if you can provide more details, I can give more specific answer.