Georges Brun-Cottan writes:
 > 
 > Hi, 
 > 
 > A friend of mine is just starting with ocaml. He was puzzled by the
 > following result:
 > 
 > # let a i = i;;
 > val a : 'a -> 'a = <fun>
 > # let b i = i;;
 > val b : 'a -> 'a = <fun>
 > # a=b;;
 > Uncaught exception: Invalid_argument "equal: functional value".
 > # a=a;;
 > - : bool = true
 > # 
 > 
 > That is 'a=a' does not return the expected exception.  Actually it
 > first hit this "curiosity" when creating a polymorphic 'sort' function
 > on lists - and by applying it to a [sort;sort..] list. It worked.
 > 
 > Is this a bug? 

I  don't  think this  behavior  is intentional,  but  it  has an  easy
explanation: for better efficiency, the structural comparison function
(in  byterun/compare.c)  first   tries  physical  equality,  and  then
structural equality if  there is no physical equality.  So in the case
of a=a, the answer is true because of physical equality.

Hope this helps,
-- 
Jean-Christophe FILLIATRE
  mailto:Jean-Christophe.Filliatre@lri.fr
  http://www.lri.fr/~filliatr
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