[Haskell-cafe] trouble installing greencard -- -fno-prune-tydecls flag ( was Re: trivial function application question )

[Ross Paterson]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2007 at 12:44:46PM +1100, Donald Bruce Stewart wrote:
> dmhouse:
> > On 06/01/07, Chris Kuklewicz <haskell at list.mightyreason.com> wrote:
> > >Running --configure notices that many things are not installed, but this 
> > >is just noise from Cabal.
> > 
> > This is the second time I've seen someone get confused by these
> > messages. I propose we add a 'Configuration successful, now type
> > runhaskell Setup.hs build.' to the bottom of the configure output.
> 
> I agree. This issue is even mentioned here:
> 
>     www.serpentine.com/blog/2007/01/05/getting-started-with-installing-third-party-haskell-packages/
> 
> Those new to Cabal always seem to assume things are going badly when
> "happy not found". We need to address the psychological aspect
> of Cabal's config process :)

But it's not enough to just say "Ignore any errors above".  Some packages
really do need happy (or some other tool) to build.  Cabal would need to
crawl over the source files to see what preprocessors are really needed.
(It does that in the build phase, but not configure.)  If haddock is
absent, you can build and install, but not build documentation.