As a newcomer(start learning about 3 months ago), I also will stand up and say i use the HP, i did meet some problems at the beginning, but the problems are all solved by reading documents and understanding more about ghc package management. Now i’m playing well with cabal sandbox and never had any problems. The main reason to use HP is that HP make ghci usable(i mean fire ghci anywhere, not cabal repl inside a project), otherwise i have to install lots of global packages by my self. Cabal and cabal-install do need some document care, but that’s all, global package doesn’t harm as long as you use sandbox. Finally, i’d say i really wish the minimal installer comes first with document link, that’s the right way to let newcomer understand how the ghc package management works and how to choose between stack/cabal.