Can I use OverlappingInstances to get nicer error messages?

Question

I'm currently dealing with some Haskell code that I didn't write, but that I've made changes to. After my changes, I run the program and get the following error message:

Prelude.!!: index too large

The call to !! is not in my code, so refactoring it away is more work than I want to do, if I can avoid it.

What I'd like is to do something like this:

class PrintList a where
  (!!) :: [a] -> Int -> a

instance (Show a) => PrintList a where
  l (!!) n = if n < (length l) 
             then (l Prelude.!! n)
             else error ("Index " ++ show n ++ " out of bounds in " ++ show l )

instance PrintList a where
  (!!) = Prelude.!!

i.e. the function !! is defined for every possible list type, but it behaves differently whenever a Show instance is defined for the element type.

Alternately, a tryShow :: a -> Maybe String method would also do the trick.

Is there a way to do this? Can I force OverlappingInstances to use the default implementation only when the Show implementation does not apply? Is this guaranteed behaviour?

EDIT: bonus points for anyone who can get the error to also print a stack-trace-like message!

Answer 1

You don't need overlapping instances, just use the GHC debugger on your own (!!):

{-# OPTIONS -Wall -O0 #-}
module Debugger3 where

import qualified Prelude as P
import Prelude hiding ((!!))

(!!) :: [a] -> Int -> a
xs !! n =
   xs P.!! n    -- line 9

foo :: Int -> Int
foo n = [0..n] !! 3

bar :: Int -> Int
bar n = foo (n-3)

main :: IO ()
main = print (bar 4)

GHCi session:

> :l Debugger3
[1 of 1] Compiling Debugger3        ( Debugger3.hs, interpreted )
Ok, modules loaded: Debugger3.
*Debugger3> :break 9
Breakpoint 1 activated at Debugger3.hs:9:4-18
*Debugger3> :trace main
Stopped at Debugger3.hs:9:4-18
_result :: a = _
n :: Int = 3
xs :: [a] = _
[Debugger3.hs:9:4-18] *Debugger3> :force xs
xs = [0,1]
[Debugger3.hs:9:4-18] *Debugger3> :history
-1  : !! (Debugger3.hs:(8,1)-(9,18))
-2  : foo (Debugger3.hs:12:9-19)
-3  : foo (Debugger3.hs:12:1-19)
-4  : bar (Debugger3.hs:15:9-17)
-5  : bar (Debugger3.hs:15:1-17)
-6  : main (Debugger3.hs:18:15-19)
-7  : main (Debugger3.hs:18:8-20)
<end of history>
[Debugger3.hs:9:4-18] *Debugger3> :back
Logged breakpoint at Debugger3.hs:(8,1)-(9,18)
_result :: a
[-1: Debugger3.hs:(8,1)-(9,18)] *Debugger3> :back
Logged breakpoint at Debugger3.hs:12:9-19
_result :: Int
n :: Int
[-2: Debugger3.hs:12:9-19] *Debugger3> n
1