Release/git plans

[Simon Peyton-Jones]

Austin

| So, given that 7.2 will be released much earlier than the normal
| release cycle, is there any room for anything else to get into HEAD
| for the 7.2 release before everything is switched? In particular I
| fixed up Max Bolingbroke's old compiler plugin work to be usable with
| the latest HEAD, and all the fundamental work is there and done, just
| some additional small things are needed (notably having ghc dump
| plugin information a la -ddump flags, and testsuite patches are about
| it I think.) The patch itself is pretty small and doesn't touch *too*
| much code, mostly adding dynamic loading and the plugin API, but it's
| arguably adding a 'big' feature for users of GHC to start utilizing,
| and perhaps a release in 7.2 would cause problems merging changes
| until you cut a new STABLE branch with git, like you said.

I'm sorry I've been slow on this.  "Review and apply the plugins patch" is in my inbox, but it's been queued up behind too many other things, notably making the new typechecker work.

I'm pretty keen on the whole plugin idea, because it makes the compiler more extensible and lowers the barrier to entry.  My only reason for delay is that I wanted to review the design (as seen by a plug-in author).  Once we provide it, we have to support it, and it's harder to change.

The fact that you are actively engaged, have done the work with Max, and are (I assume) happy to respond to user queries, fix bugs etc, is a major incentive.  Thank you!

So yes, because of that I undertake to do this for 7.2 [unless Simon M tells me no :-)].  I'll add a few thoughts to the ticket right now.  http://hackage.haskell.org/trac/ghc/ticket/3843.  Interested parties, add yourselves to the cc list of the ticket.

Simon