catflap.org Online Dictionary Query

  curried function
       
           A function of N arguments that
          is considered as a function of one argument which returns
          another function of N-1 arguments.  E.g. in Haskell we can
          define:
       
          	average :: Int -> (Int -> Int)
       
          (The parentheses are optional).  A partial application of
          average, to one Int, e.g. (average 4), returns a function of
          type (Int -> Int) which averages its argument with 4.  In
          uncurried languages a function must always be applied to all
          its arguments but a partial application can be represented
          using a lambda abstraction:
       
          	\ x -> average(4,x)
       
          Currying is necessary if full laziness is to be applied to
          functional sub-expressions.
       
          It was named after the logician Haskell Curry but the
          19th-century logician, Gottlob Frege was the first to
          propose it and it was first referred to in ["Uber die
          Bausteine der mathematischen Logik", M. Schoenfinkel,
          Mathematische Annalen. Vol 92 (1924)].
       
          David Turner said he got the term from Christopher
          Strachey who invented the term "currying" and used it in his
          lecture notes on programming languages written circa 1967.
          Strachey also remarked that it ought really to be called
          "Schoenfinkeling".
       
          Stefan Kahrs  reported hearing somebody in
          Germany trying to introduce "scho"nen" for currying and
          "finkeln" for "uncurrying".  The verb "scho"nen" means "to
          beautify"; "finkeln" isn't a German word, but it suggests "to
          fiddle".
       
          ["Some philosophical aspects of combinatory logic",
          H. B. Curry, The Kleene Symposium, Eds. J. Barwise,
          J. Keisler, K. Kunen, North Holland, 1980, pp. 85-101]
       
          (2002-07-24)