Haskell's algebraic data types

Question

I\'m trying to fully understand all of Haskell\'s concepts.

In what ways are algebraic data types similar to generic types, e.g., in C# and Java? And how are they di

Answer 1

A simple reason why they are called algebraic; there are both sum (logical disjunction) and product (logical conjunction) types. A sum type is a discriminated union, e.g:

data Bool = False | True

A product type is a type with multiple parameters:

data Pair a b = Pair a b

In O'Caml "product" is made more explicit:

type 'a 'b pair = Pair of 'a * 'b