Yeah. I think there are a lot of us out there. I won't rant (much) here, because I hope to get some help from time to time. Alienating people is not a good way to get help.

But:

There are many things I like about the language, but I have always been perplexed by the haskell ecosystem in a couple of ways. However good and/or interesting a language might be, it is not possible to do meat and potatoes development unless there is a good supply of packages/libraries.

My first problem was that I often just could not get stuff to install. The second problem was documentation. I hope it has improved a bit. I was always flabbergasted at the (apparent) belief that a few lines of API documentation coughed out by haddock are enough. But that's all there was in a lot of cases. That, and "refer to xxxx research paper" and "figure it out from the types". Hah. Any math paper that consisted of just the equations sorted in alphabetical order would not be well received, I think.

I really admired that fact that Michael Snoyman wrote a book about Yesod. For all I know he may not have kept the book up, but at least he realized that people needed an explanation of how to use his software.

Well, back to work. I am going to give haskell another try for sure. It's just too tempting to give up on. If it doesn't work, the next stop will be sml or ocaml.

Best,

- DJ -

On 15-03-01 09:56 AM, emacstheviking wrote:

I feel your pain...

Confession: I abandoned Haskell two years ago because of frustration with cabal and hackage. I decided to get back to the language today, and to start with Haskell School of Expression. I immediately run into the problem that the first thing I try to install with cabal does not work.

It is the same reason I have stopped using it. It's a real shame. Those with better education and understanding than mine should be concerned that the uptake of the language is stunted by its package manager.

I love Haskell. I have taught myself (the beginnings at least) of group theory just to better comprehend the mindset of monads. For that alone I am glad I learned Haskell as it has rekindled my interest in maths!

Thanks for any help. Please tell me things are not just as bad now as they were when I left ;-)

This mail seems to indicate to me that "cabal hell" is here for some time to come...
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