Haskell High Performance Programming

Chapter 2. Choosing the Correct Data Structures

Perhaps the next most important topic in Haskell performance after lazy evaluation is data structures. I say the next most important because although data structures form a wider area than lazy evaluation, the unique performance aspects of lazy evaluation should deserve more attention. Still, structuring data efficiently is a must for performance, and in Haskell this often requires taking laziness into account, too.

Haskell gives the programmer lots of variety and clutches to structuring data, ranging from low-level primitives to ingenious, purely functional data structures. The traditional (re-)implementation costs associated with quick'n'dirty versus highly optimized solutions are really low in ...