[Nix-dev] Move to GHC 7.8.2

[Mateusz Kowalczyk]

On 05/05/2014 11:23 PM, Peter Simons wrote:
> Hi guys,
> 
> I would like to get some feedback on how you feel about moving to GHC 7.8.2
> as the default compiler of choice?
> 
> What are the most significant road blocks right now in your opinion?
> 
> Personally, I'll use the occasion to remove most of the Haskell Platform
> related magic that's currently performed in haskell-defaults.nix, i.e. I
> would like to abandon the notion that certain compilers prefer older
> versions of HP packages because these versions were "mandated" at the time
> the compiler was released. Instead, I'd use the latest version possible of
> every package for every compiler.
> 
> Here are some ideas in no particular order:
> 
>  1) We provide haskellPlatform_X_Y_Z attributes in all-packages.nix that
>     install a particular version of HP -- including the corresponding GHC
>     --, but the library choices in those packages have no effect on any of
>     the haskellPackages_ghcXYZ.foobar packages.
> 
>  2) The haskellPackages_ghcXYZ.haskellPlatform attribute becomes a
>     collection of packages that corresponds roughly to the set of packages
>     that the official HP offers, and you can expect those packages to build
>     and interact nicely with each other, but the versions won't necessarily
>     conform to any HP standard. For example, that 'haskellPlatform'
>     attribute will always contain the *latest version* of Cabal and
>     cabal-install, regardless of what the HP standard says. That attribute
>     can be thought of as "recommended popular packages in stable versions",
>     but it doesn't try to conform to any particular version of the HP. The
>     packages from (1) do that. Maybe we shouldn't even call it
>     'haskellPlatform'?
> 
>  3) I would like to drop a whole lot of obsolete GHC versions. As a rule of
>     thumb, I think we should keep the latest version of every major release,
>     i.e. 6.10.4, 6.12.3, 7.0.4, 7.2.2, 7.4.2, 7.6.2, and 7.8.2 -- but none
>     of the intermediate versions. It's intellectually satisfying to have
>     support for GHC 6.12.2 still around, but honestly ... who needs it?
> 
> Share your thoughts, please!
> 
> Best regards,
> Peter
> 
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> 

I would wait until 7.8.3 is released which should be last release in the
7.8.x family, unless moving between compiler versions is not difficult.

There is currently no ETA for 7.8.3 so if it'll be easy to go from 7.8.2
to 7.8.3 when the time comes then I like this idea.

-- 
Mateusz K.