[ANNOUNCE] GHC 8.6.1-beta1 available

[Richard Eisenberg]

> On Aug 11, 2018, at 11:27 AM, Vassil Ognyanov Keremidchiev <varosi at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> What are the new features there toward Dependent Typed Haskell?

Ben's link to https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/8.6.1-notes.html <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/8.6.1-notes.html> includes several items, pasted here:

* A new StarIsType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-StarIsType> language extension has been added which controls whether * is parsed as Data.Kind.Type or a regular type operator. StarIsType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-StarIsType> is enabled by default.

* CUSKs now require all kind variables to be explicitly quantified. This was already the case with TypeInType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-TypeInType>, but now PolyKinds <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-PolyKinds> also exhibits this behavior.

* Functionality of TypeInType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-TypeInType> has been subsumed by PolyKinds <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-PolyKinds>, and it is now merely a shorthand for PolyKinds <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-PolyKinds>, DataKinds <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-DataKinds>, and NoStarIsType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-StarIsType>. The users are advised to avoid TypeInType <https://downloads.haskell.org/~ghc/8.6.1-beta1/docs/html/users_guide/glasgow_exts.html#extension-TypeInType> due to its misleading name: the Type :: Type axiom holds regardless of whether it is enabled.

These are small steps, to be sure, but there's quite a bit going on behind the scenes. For example see the "Coercion Quantification" and "Type-level visible type applications" to take place at HIW (https://icfp18.sigplan.org/track/hiw-2018-papers#event-overview <https://icfp18.sigplan.org/track/hiw-2018-papers#event-overview>).

There are also a great many proposals in play at https://github.com/ghc-proposals/ghc-proposals <https://github.com/ghc-proposals/ghc-proposals>

More to come in the future, of course!
Richard
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