Stream: General

Topic: Case distinction on returned constructor


view this post on Zulip Gergely Buday (Sep 20 2023 at 10:23):

I have a datatype along the lines of

datatype 'a dummy = Foo 'a | Bar 'a => 'a dummy

Is it possible to do a case distinction on whether a Bar value's function returns a Foo or a Bar?

view this post on Zulip Wolfgang Jeltsch (Sep 20 2023 at 10:56):

I fear I don’t fully understand what you mean. For a case distinction you would need a fixed argument for the function under Bar, I’d say. Could you please clarify?

view this post on Zulip Gergely Buday (Sep 20 2023 at 11:56):

@Wolfgang Jeltsch but that's the point, I do not have an argument there, only the function.

view this post on Zulip Yong Kiam (Sep 20 2023 at 14:29):

I agree with @Wolfgang Jeltsch this doesn't seem like a well-formed question:

If I have a Bar f, the function f can return either Foo or another Bar depending on its input

view this post on Zulip Wolfgang Jeltsch (Sep 20 2023 at 15:03):

Gergely Buday said:

Wolfgang Jeltsch but that's the point, I do not have an argument there, only the function.

But what exactly do you want to do?

view this post on Zulip Wolfgang Jeltsch (Sep 20 2023 at 15:07):

Case distinction is about having different subproofs of different kinds of values that some variable can take. For example, if your variable is of type nat, you can distinguish between the cases 0 and Suc _. But what should your cases for 'a ⇒ 'a dummy be? There are functions in this type that return only Foo values, others that return only Bar values, yet others that return Foo values for some arguments and Barvalues for others according to whatever patterns.


Last updated: Dec 21 2024 at 16:20 UTC