Is there a scala identity function?

Question

If I have something like a List[Option[A]] and I want to convert this into a List[A], the standard way is to use flatMap:

Answer 1

You could just give the type inferencer a little help:

scala> val l = List(Some("Hello"), None, Some("World"))
l: List[Option[java.lang.String]] = List(Some(Hello), None, Some(World))

scala> l.flatten[String]
res0: List[String] = List(Hello, World)