One Year of F#
It’s already been about a year since I started learning F#. Perhaps a small update is in order.
I think it’s fair to say that F# and the functional programming (FP) paradigm have rejuvenated my passion for programming. The elegance and power of FP are refreshing and fascinating, and it’s immensely satisfying to write FP code. I never would have expected F# to take my “favorite language” crown from C#, but it has.
I think many people (including me in the recent past) assume that FP has a much higher barrier to entry than it has. Of course, there are some new (and interesting!) things to learn, but I’ve found that just diving in and learning concepts as I go is sufficient to get started, be productive, and have fun.
What’s next? I’ve also dug into Haskell and OCaml a little too. F# is great, but I’d like to know more about those languages’ more powerful type systems too. I’m still unsure which, if either, I’ll focus on, though.
My opinion: Every software engineer should spend some time with a functional-first FP language—and if you’re already a .NET engineer, F# is the obvious choice. Whether or not you decide to stick with it, I feel confident you’ll come away a better software engineer.