Brent Yorgey writes:

On Sun, Nov 25, 2012 at 06:09:26PM -0500, Albert Y. C. Lai wrote:

...

If you begin with "cabal configure", the correct idiom is:

cabal configure [flags] cabal build [cabal haddock, if you want] cabal copy cabal register

Even this does not do the same thing as 'cabal install', because it does not download and install any dependencies (whereas 'cabal install' does).

...but if he prepended a 'cabal install --only-dependencies' to the invocation sequence it would, wouldn't it?

On 12-11-26 04:34 AM, Kim-Ee Yeoh wrote:

Nice tip, Albert! Good to know! One question I have is, is (runghc Setup.lhs) equivalent to (cabal) in

runghc Setup.lhs <$> [configure, build, install]

?

Setup defaults to --global --prefix=/usr/local cabal defaults to --user --prefix=$HOME/.cabal This confuses a lot of people. FAQ #1: Why does "Setup copy" abort and say "no permission"? Answer: because you haven't escalated privilege for writing to /usr/local FAQ #2: Why does "sudo cabal install" register nothing in both the global database and my database? Answer: because "--user" means not global, and "sudo" means the user is root, not you. Look under /root. Lastly, there is no "Setup install". Use "copy" and "register".

On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 8:08 AM, Brent Yorgey mailto:byorgey@seas.upenn.edu> wrote:

> [cabal haddock, if you want] > cabal copy > cabal register

Even this does not do the same thing as 'cabal install', because it does not download and install any dependencies (whereas 'cabal install' does).

Brent, that's useful to know too, thanks!

Fwiw, I think Albert had the backdrop of classic GNU autoconf in mind, predating all that newfangled stuff of downloading (!) dependencies (!!).

This is ignorant of a common workflow. "cabal configure" is used by a lot of programmers. Today. Why? Because they use it on their own projects. They use cabal-install as a builder, not exactly an installer. In fact, some of them do: cabal configure cabal build cabal register --inplace This has no "cabal install" correspondence. So you ask, "but surely their own projects require some packages from hackage?" Yes, surely. But those packages have already been installed in the past, once and for all. That is, when the project started, they already did "cabal install yesod". This is not so old-school, is it?

On 12-11-27 01:02 AM, kudah wrote:

On Mon, 26 Nov 2012 18:21:33 -0500 "Albert Y. C. Lai" wrote:

...

Lastly, there is no "Setup install". Use "copy" and "register".

$ runghc Setup.hs --help [...]

...

install Copy the files into the install locations. Run register. copy Copy the files into the install locations.

I stand corrected, thank you. But then to complete answering a previous question, "Setup install" does not configure, does not build, and is far from "cabal install".

(newer) cabal build registers inplace automatically.

I see where you heard this, but it is a misrepresentation from cabal, and older cabal has always told a similar misrepresentation. When "cabal build" succeeds, it always says: (older) "registering <name>-<version>" (newer) "In-place registering <name>-<version>" That's what it says. But use ghc-pkg and other tests to verify that no registration whatsoever has happened.

On 12-11-27 04:40 AM, kudah wrote:

On Tue, 27 Nov 2012 02:20:35 -0500 "Albert Y. C. Lai" wrote:

...

When "cabal build" succeeds, it always says:

(older) "registering <name>-<version>" (newer) "In-place registering <name>-<version>"

That's what it says. But use ghc-pkg and other tests to verify that no registration whatsoever has happened.

It doesn't register in user package-db, it registers in it's own dist/package.conf.inplace. If it didn't you wouldn't be able to build an executable and a library in one package such that executable depends on the library.

That's fair. But it also means cabal configure cabal build is not equivalent to cabal configure cabal build cabal register --inplace which was the context when you said "(newer) cabal build registers inplace automatically".