GHC release timing and future build infrastructure

[Bardur Arantsson]

On 2017-08-02 21:26, Bardur Arantsson wrote:

> I'd like to add a few thoughs (or just to underscore the ones you've
> already brought forth, as the case may be):
> 
[--snip--]
> reasons -- I wouldn't presume to know. Also note that this is
> *basically* how Rust also works, it's just that they keep the "unstable"
> bits behind a feature flag (until they're deemed 'stable') instead of
> actually having different code bases.
> 

Sorry about the self-reply and excesive bolding-for-emphasis. The point
of this past paragraph was that *perhaps* GHC could move towards
(short-lived!) "feature flags" for the compiler[1]. Again, I have no
experience with the GHC development process so maybe it's completely
absurd to even contemplate such a thing (in terms of effort).

Continuing with the thought from [1]: What if there were "stability
tiers" of LANGUAGE PRAGMA? Obviously, it doesn't *literally* have to be
like that, but maybe the concept works?

[1] I suppose LANGUAGE Pragmas are *kind* of like feature flags, but IME
LANGUAGE Pragmas tend to be actually be quite long-lived.

Regards,