Thank you both for responding.
I'm not trying to point out flaws or faults in FP, quite the contrary. I'm asking questions mainly related to porting a big application from Borland Pascal / Virtual Pascal to Free Pascal. In that process (or attempted process), I run across quite a few question marks. I can of course just keep my mouth shut and go on my merry way and continue doing "my own I/O" (for example). But if the tables were turned, I for one would appreciate questions of a different nature, even if they require my explaining
There are many ways of doing most things, and I think that learning as many of them as possible is often a good idea, if for nothing else then to avoid being stuck in the same frame of mind. "Proper software design" is an interesting subject, and I'm guessing there are more theories about that than there are so-called programmers.
I don't know what an "advanced programmer" is, but I can't see how disqualifying someone else's needs just because they don't agree with your own opinions is a very fruitful direction to take. When I started coding (1983), there very few "best practice" things around ... so, you make up your own best practice. I'm glad to see things evolve.
Most of the time, I think you'll find that my questions are actually meant to ask people who have more knowledge of FP than I what "Best practice" (in a FP context) is. That, at least, is my only intention.
If I stepped on someone's toes, then I apologize.