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+# The official Aula Lens FAQ
+
+This document is used to distribute knowledge of the lens library
+within the aula dev team.  It is hoped to be of wider usefulness, but
+always rooted in aula-specific situations and examples.
+
+Questions are losely organized by the time they arise (youngest
+first).
+
+
+## What is the idea of "prismatic exception types"?
+
+Context: ?.
+
+...
+
+
+## Lenses vs. Prisms vs. Traversals
+
+Context: PR#209.
+
+```
+data IdeaLocation =
+      IdeaLocationSpace { _ideaLocationSpace :: IdeaSpace }
+    | IdeaLocationTopic { _ideaLocationSpace :: IdeaSpace, _ideaLocationTopicId :: AUID Topic }
+
+makeLenses ''IdeaLocation
+```
+
+Following the docs of https://hackage.haskell.org/package/lens-4.13/docs/Control-Lens-TH.html#v:makeLenses we get a lens to access the idea space and only a traversal to access the topic id.
+
+```
+ideaLocationSpace :: Lens' IdeaLocation IdeaSpace
+ideaLocationTopicId :: Traversal' IdeaLocation (AUID Topic)
+```
+
+My guess is that this type is impossible to fulfill. `ideaLocationTopicId` cannot be:
+
+* a getter, since there might be no `AUID Topic`
+* a lens, since it cannot be a getter
+* a prism, since we cannot reconstruct the `IdeaSpace` if we start only with an `AUID Topic`
+
+What we have from my previous comment is a `Traversal' IdeaLocation (AUID Topic)`.
+Looking at the main diagram https://hackage.haskell.org/package/lens-4.13 a traversal is weaker than a lens or a prism. A traversal can be turned into a setter or a fold. Assume `t` to be a
+`Traversal' s a`:
+
+* `s ^.. t` get all the elements as a list: `[a]`
+* `s ^? t` get the first element: `Maybe a`
+* `s & t .~ a` set all the elements to `a`.
+* `s & t %~ f` modify all the elements with `f`.
+
+Then `ideaTopicId` is the composition of `ideaLocation` (a lens) and `ideaLocationTopicId` (a traversal). However guessing the correct type signature can be difficult. My advice is to omit the type
+signatures at first. Since a traversal is weaker than a lens the resulting composite is a traversal.
+
+```
+ideaTopicId :: Traversal' Idea (AUID Topic)
+ideaTopicId = ideaLocation . ideaLocationTopicId
+```
+
+What you were getting at with "is it somehow ok to yield a maybe here?" is that we know that there is either no topic id or a single topic id. The traversal is weaker it can be any number of them.
+A custom lens can be written as:
+
+```
+ideaLocationMaybeTopicId :: Lens' IdeaLocation (Maybe (AUID Topic))
+ideaLocationMaybeTopicId f = \case
+    IdeaLocationSpace spc     -> mk spc <$> f Nothing
+    IdeaLocationTopic spc tid -> mk spc <$> f (Just tid)
+  where
+    mk spc = \case
+        Nothing  -> IdeaLocationSpace spc
+        Just tid -> IdeaLocationTopic spc tid
+```
+
+The composite lens is then:
+
+```
+ideaMaybeTopicId :: Lens' Idea (Maybe (AUID Topic))
+ideaMaybeTopicId = ideaLocation . ideaLocationMaybeTopicId
+```