[dmitriid]

Commenting on the edited comment :)

> Notice that your 5 - 10 lines of JS don't let you write code that works in any monad, whereas I can easily write

Maybe, maybe not. Depends on your requirements, really. The core language might never get this, but these 5-10 lines of code do some very important things:

- they explain monads faster and clearer than any of the countless monad tutorials that exist for Haskell

- they demystify monads and show that: hey, you've probably been writing monads all along (and re-implemented them yourself countless of times, no doubt)

- they (by necessity) dumb down the jargon-heavy lingo for easy consumption by average Joes like me :)

Edit: that page in particular has also shown me that I have used easily half of Haskell's things (functors of all flavors, monads, comonads, etc. etc. etc.) countless times over the years in Javascript and Erlang. I didn't even know I did, because no one scared me off with the theory, and strange explanations and names :)

[tel]

Is it fair to say that your argument here is that "this resource was extremely valuable to me for understanding certain concepts in ways that Haskell-oriented resources in the past have not been"?

I think that's a totally fair criticism. I also believe that the Haskell resources can provide further value to you (and others in your position) over time if you choose to study them. Similarly, studying category theory or type theory or logic could.

Are these practical things to do? It depends upon your goals.

[mrkgnao]

Sure! I don't disagree: Haskell learning materials are a far cry from adequate, and we definitely need to learn from, e.g. the Rust/Elixir/Elm communities here. For now, this is worth trying:

http://haskellbook.com/

Also, #haskell on IRC has been, without a doubt, one of the friendliest learning environments I've ever seen. Drop by sometime if the mood strikes you. :)

[willtim]

This is not really a definition of a Monad. For example, there's no mention of the Monad laws.

Monads are a very general and powerful abstraction that are not adequately described by your example. My advice to anyone is to read Phil Wadler's seminal paper, it is very easy to read.