When to use a functional programming language?

functional-programming language-agnostic
Alex Baranosky picture Alex Baranosky · Dec 29, 2008 · Viewed 50.4k times · Source

In which situations should I choose to use a functional programming language over a more verbose object-oriented language like C++, C# or Java?

I understand what functional programming is, what I don't really understand is for what types of problems is it a perfect solution?

Answer

Alex Baranosky picture Alex Baranosky · Dec 29, 2008

I've done some research into this myself and thought I might add CONCURRENCY to the list of reasons to use a functional language. See at some point in the near future processor speed will not be able to increase using the same cpu technology. The physics of the architecture won't allow it.

So that is where concurrent processing comes in.

Unfortunately most OOP languages cannot take advantage of multiple processors at once because of the interdependencies between data.

In pure functional programming languages the computer can run two (or many more) functions at once because those functions are not altering outside state information.

Here is an excellent article on functional programming you may enjoy.

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