Monads and More in 5 Minutes or Less

Too Long; Didn't Read

The necessity of monads in Haskell maintains the pure functionality of the language but can test the patience of its programmers. An understanding of monads is essential if you want to work with Haskell. This tutorial offers a quick look at the structure of the <code class="markup--code markup--p-code"><a href="http://hackage.haskell.org/package/base-4.11.1.0/docs/Control-Monad.html" target="_blank">Monad</a></code> typeclass. While you’ll need familiarity with Haskell, specifically, to understand how to tackle its <code class="markup--code markup--p-code">Monad</code> typeclass, the concepts presented in this tutorial are easily transferred to other languages. We’ll also be covering the <code class="markup--code markup--p-code"><a href="http://hackage.haskell.org/package/base-4.11.1.0/docs/Control-Applicative.html" target="_blank">Applicative</a></code> and <code class="markup--code markup--p-code"><a href="http://hackage.haskell.org/package/base-4.11.1.0/docs/Data-Functor.html" target="_blank">Functor</a></code> typeclasses. Let’s start with the boring, technical definition. A monad is a particular typeclass that is primarily composed of 2 functions, <code class="markup--code markup--p-code">bind</code> and <code class="markup--code markup--p-code">return</code>. This is simple enough, right? Now let’s break down some terminology and find out why these 2 functions are so powerful and how all of this affects your real world code.