I need to make a Quadtree in Haskell. But I never used the language before. As I understand, there is no null pointers in Haskell. So how could I instantiate a null version of Group for the pointers of the Quadtree(if there is even a way)?
data Group = Group {
idf :: Int,
name :: String,
lat :: Int,
long :: Int,
nw :: Group,
ne :: Group,
sw :: Group,
se :: Group
} deriving Show
main :: IO()
main = do
let g1 = Group { idf = 0, name = "Ababa", lat = 32, long = 40, nw = ???}
print g1
I know Maybe exists. No idea how to use it in this context though.
You use Maybe
. It's a type that can have values of two different kinds: either Nothing
or Just x
where x
is a value of some other type.
data Group = Group {
...
nw :: Maybe Group,
ne :: Maybe Group,
sw :: Maybe Group,
se :: Maybe Group
} deriving Show
main = do
let g1 = Group { ..., nw = Nothing, ne = Nothing, sw = Nothing, se = Nothing }
print g1
...
let g2 = Group { ... ne = Just g1, ... }