Strange Loop

2009 - 2023

/

St. Louis, MO

Running a startup on Haskell

At MailRank, we've built our server technology stack using the Haskell programming language. Haskell gives us a tremendously different environment from Python, PHP, and so on, so why have we made such an esoteric choice?

In this talk, we'll talk about the reasons for our choice, and some of the advantages and disadvantages we've observed along the way. In particular, we'll survey the Haskell-based technologies that make it a great fit for companies working in tight constraints, who must produce excellent products quickly.

Click to view published talk video

Bryan O'Sullivan

Bryan O'Sullivan

MailRank

Bryan O'Sullivan is an Irish hacker, writer, and entrepreneur who lives in San Francisco. He has written books on leading-edge topics in distributed systems and functional programming, including "Mercurial: The Definitive Guide" and the Jolt award winner "Real World Haskell". He is a prolific author of open source software, and his startup background ranges from huge supercomputers to tiny set-top boxes. Most recently, he cofounded and is CTO of MailRank, a San Francisco email productivity company. He and his kids spend a lot of time in the Sierra Nevada mountains, where they're likely to be rock climbing, backpacking, or skiing.