Generating valid Haskell code using the GHC API pretty printer

[Jan Schaumlöffel]

Hello everyone,

we are trying to use the GHC API for a source-to-source transformation
on Haskell programs.  The result of parsing and typechecking a module
enables us to apply the transformation, but writing the transformed
module back using the pretty printer (Outputable) generates invalid
Haskell code.

For one thing, since even the names defined in the current module are
fully qualified, the resulting code is not valid anymore.

This can be worked around, but there is another issue: Simply reading
the following program and then writing it out using the pretty printer
renders the resulting code invalid.

> module Main where
> main = do
>  if True then putStrLn "longlonglonglonglonglongline"
>          else return ()
>  longlonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglongname $ "test"
> longlonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglongname = putStrLn

The result looks like this:

> Main.main = do if GHC.Bool.True then
>                    System.IO.putStrLn "longlonglonglonglonglongline"
>                else
>                    GHC.Base.return ()
>                  Main.longlonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglongname
>                GHC.Base.$
>                  "test"
> Main.longlonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglonglongname = System.IO.putStrLn

There are two different problems in this output:

1) the indentation of "if ... then ... else" violates the "do"-block
   layout rule
2) the indentation of the long function call is invalid

It looks like those problems could be avoided if the pretty printer
could be configured to consistently use "do { ... ; ... }" notation,
but we have been unable to figure out how.  Is there a canonical way
to use the GHC API to pretty print to valid Haskell code?

Kind regards,
Jan

Appended is our current code to execute the transformation above (the
module to be read is expected in a file "dummy.hs" for simplicity).
Please excuse if this might not be a minimal example.

module Main where

import GHC
import GHC.Paths
import Outputable

main = do
  x <- runGhc (Just libdir) $ do
    dflags <- getSessionDynFlags
    setSessionDynFlags (dflags { hscTarget = HscNothing,
                                 ghcLink = NoLink })

    target <- guessTarget "dummy.hs" Nothing
    setTargets [target]
    load LoadAllTargets

    graph <- getModuleGraph
    let unparsedmod = head graph

    parsedmod <- parseModule unparsedmod
    typecheckedmod <- typecheckModule parsedmod
    let Just renamedsource = renamedSource typecheckedmod
        (group,_,_,_,_) = renamedsource
        moduledings = (ms_mod unparsedmod)

    return (showSDoc (ppr group))
  putStr $ x ++ "\n"

-- 
If you're happy and you know it, syntax error!
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