The Glasgow Haskell Compiler -- version 4.08.2 ================================================ We are pleased to announce a new release of the Glasgow Haskell Compiler (GHC), version 4.08.2. The source distribution is freely available via the World-Wide Web and through anon. FTP, under a BSD-style license. See below for download details. Pre-built packages for Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris and Win32 are also available. Haskell is "the" standard lazy functional programming language; the current language version is Haskell 98, agreed in December 1998. GHC is a state-of-the-art optimising compiler for Haskell, generating good code for a variety of platforms. The distribution includes space and time profiling facilities, a large collection of libraries, and support for various language extensions, including concurrency, exceptions, and foreign language interfaces (C, C++, whatever). A wide variety of Haskell related resources (tutorials, libraries, specifications, documentation, compilers, interpreters, references, contact information, links to research groups) are available from the Haskell home page at http://www.haskell.org/ GHC's Web page lives at http://www.haskell.org/ghc/ + What's new in 4.08.2 ======================= No new features, just a few minor bug fixes. + What's new in 4.08 ===================== This should be a stable release. There have been many enhancements since 4.06, and shed-loads of bug-fixes (one shed (imperial) ~ one ton (US)). There are the following changes - New profiling subsystem, based on cost-centre stacks. - Working x86 native code generator: now it works properly, runs about twice as fast as compiling via C, and is on a par for run-time speed (except in FP-intensive programs). - Implicit parameters (i.e. dynamic scoping without the pain). - DEPRECATED pragma for marking obsolescent interfaces. - In the wake of hslibs, a new package system for libraries. -package should now be used instead of -syslib. - Result type signatures work. - Many tiresome long-standing bugs and problems (e.g. the trace problem) have been fixed. - Many error messages have been made more helpful and/or accurate. For full details see the release notes: http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/4.08/users_guide/release-4-08.html + Important Info For Win32 users ================================= ALERT: For reasons as yet not understood, as of January 2001 Cygwin's mingw package has a problem that causes GHC-compiled binaries to be built incorrectly. The fix is to ensure that your mingw package is dated 20001111 (you can set this in the Cygwin installer). See the installation guide for more details. + Mailing lists ================ We run mailing lists for GHC users and bug reports; to subscribe, use the web interfaces at http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/glasgow-haskell-users http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/glasgow-haskell-bugs There are several other haskell and ghc-related mailing lists on www.haskell.org; for the full list, see http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/ Please send bug reports about GHC to glasgow-haskell-bugs@haskell.org; GHC users hang out on glasgow-haskell-users@haskell.org. Bleeding edge CVS users party on cvs-ghc@haskell.org. + On-line GHC-related resources ================================ Relevant URLs on the World-Wide Web: GHC home page http://www.haskell.org/ghc/ Haskell home page http://www.haskell.org/ comp.lang.functional FAQ http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~gmh/faq.html + How to get it ================ The easy way is to go to the WWW page, which should be self-explanatory: http://www.haskell.org/ghc/ Once you have the distribution, please follow the pointers in the README file to find all of the documentation about this release. NB: preserve modification times when un-tarring the files (no `m' option for tar, please)! + System requirements ====================== To compile the sources, you need a machine with 32+MB memory, GNU C (`gcc'), `perl' plus a version of GHC installed (3.02 at least). This release is known to work on the following platforms: * i386-unknown-{linux,freebsd,netbsd,cygwin32,mingw32} * sparc-sun-solaris2 * hppa1.1-hp-hpux{9,10} Ports to the following platforms should be relatively easy (for a wunderhacker), but haven't been tested due to lack of time/hardware: * i386-unknown-solaris2 * alpha-dec-osf{2,3} * mips-sgi-irix{5,6} * {rs6000,powerpc}-ibm-aix The builder's guide included in distribution gives a complete run-down of what ports work; an on-line version can be found at http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/4.08/building/building-guide.html