Hi, I intend to use Haskell on embedded systems (ARM and MIPS), where porting and even installing a compiler is not an option. So I definitively need a cross-compiler, and to my dismay I have find out that there is by now no Haskell compiler distribution with this capacity. So. I have tried to modify the source of nhc98 so that it supports being configured as a cross-compiler. The result is in the attached patch. In the current state it makes an error during the compilation ( cabal-parse is probably not compiled with the correct compiler ) but the result of "make install" is able to cross-compile correctly the program: main = print("hello world") . So I send the patch as it in the hope that others will have a look at it and even finish it (hint, hint). I have somewhat the feeling we are very close to get a fully working cross-compiler SHORTCOMINGS: This patch is ugly. Please consider it as something experimental rather as a true proposal. * The name of the cross-compiler is hard coded in nhc98.inst, so if you want to test it, you must adapt that. * it uses the presence of a environment variable (TARGET) to know if a cross-compiler is wished. It should be a "--target" flag to ./configure, but I was not sure how to implement it at best ( by the way, would it not be better to use the GNU autotools for that ? ) * As I said, the compilation doesn't even complete * I had to remove the -m32 flag because it was not supported by the version of the ARM GCC cross-compiler I have installed. HOW TO TEST $ patch -p 1 < ../nhc98-1.20-with-cross-compilation.patch1 $ CC=/usr/local/uclibc-0.9.28-3/arm/bin/arm-linux-gcc TARGET=arm-linux ./configure --prefix=/home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux $ TARGET=arm-linux make basic $ TARGET=arm-linux make install As a result: sylvain@portable:/tmp$ TARGET=arm-linux /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/bin/nhc98 -v /tmp/toto.hs -o /tmp/toto /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/nhc98comp +RTS -RTS -P/home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/include/nhc98/packages/base -I. -P/home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/include/nhc98 /tmp/toto.hs /tmp/toto.hs /tmp/toto.11658.hi /tmp/toto.11658.hc rm /tmp/toto.11658.hi /usr/local/uclibc-0.9.28-3/arm/bin/arm-linux-gcc -D__NHC__=120 -x c -S -DLOW_BYTE_FIRST -I/home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/include/nhc98/ /tmp/toto.11658.hc -o /tmp/toto.11658.s rm /tmp/toto.11658.hc /usr/local/uclibc-0.9.28-3/arm/bin/arm-linux-gcc -D__NHC__=120 -c -o /tmp/toto.o /tmp/toto.11658.s rm /tmp/toto.11658.s /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/nhc98heap | /usr/local/uclibc-0.9.28-3/arm/bin/arm-linux-gcc -D__NHC__=120 -x c -c -o /tmp/nhc11658.o - /usr/local/uclibc-0.9.28-3/arm/bin/arm-linux-gcc -D__NHC__=120 -o /tmp/toto /tmp/toto.o /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/main.o /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/mutlib.o /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/mutator.o /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Prelude.a /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Runtime.a /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Prelude.a /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Runtime.a /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Prelude.a /home/sylvain/bin/nhc98-1.20-arm-linux/lib/nhc98/arm-linux/Runtime.a /tmp/nhc11658.o -lm rm -f /tmp/nhc11658.o /tmp/nhc11658.c on my ARM system ( running on a Qemu image downloaded from the Qemu site ): $./toto hello world nice :) I hope this patch will wake some interest in the developers of nhc98. Having the ability to work as cross-compiler would be a bonus for a compiler, and more generally for the use of the Haskell language in embedded systems. I personnaly do think this is a must have. Greetings, Sylvain PS: the patch is against the distribution nhc98-1.20. The head of the darcs repository seems unable to build for now.