[erlang-questions] Simple Erlang Recommendation (last returned value)

[Jesper Louis Andersen]

On Mon, Jul 28, 2008 at 2:47 AM, Richard A. O'Keefe <ok@REDACTED> wrote:

> Also, functional language with explicit 'let' allow
>        let val x = 1 in
>        let val x = x + 1 in
>        x+1 end end
> (SML) or

This is infected with Ocaml syntax style :) The SML way would be:

let
  val x = 1
  val x = x + 1
in
  x + 1
end

But at least one SML compiler has a warning with this style of coding
since you are shadowing the 'x' value and it quickly becomes rather
hard to follow what def-point is meant for each use (To the
non-SML'ers, let .. in .. end works somewhat like Schemes LET*). With
SML beginners, you often see "imperative" style code where the
let-blocks evaluation order is used to force imperative code while a
more functional solution is apparent to the experienced.

What the let-binding tends to be used for is to declare a number of
local functions (Which may be recursive) and then gradually combine
these into more advanced functions, of which the last is called in the
body of the binding.