[Haskell-cafe] haskell-platform problems on (latest) knoppix

[dhw at thedance.net]

Background: I'm an experienced Linuxer, but not experienced with the Debian
package-management tools.  I recently decided it was time to renew my
acquaintance with Haskell, which began before the do-notation, with Hugs. 
Seeing the warnings on the ghc website, I decided to install a Linux
distribution with a strongly checked package system.  I chose Knoppix-7.2.0
i386 (the latest, dated mid-2013), which installed with few problems (now
fixed).  It claimed to be based on wheezy, the stable branch. 
Even though the version of haskell-platform in wheezy/stable
was from mid-2012, I presumed it would be debugged by now - after all,
that's
what "stable" is supposed to mean.  So I hooked it up to the net, and
entered

      apt-get install haskell-platform

After a few seconds, it said that there were broken packages - I think they
were
libglut-dev and libgl-dev - and that it couldn't fix them.  Aptitude, which
has
a menu-item called 'fix broken packages', couldn't fix them, either.  If I 
recall correctly, there were intrinsically unsatisfiable version
constraints,
i.e. >=V and <V for the same V.

So my question is: have I somehow introduced this (I re-used a
knoppix-data.img
without ensuring it was empty) or is the problem upstream from me?  (i.e
does
anyone else have this problem?)  Looking at the open bug list for haskell-
package, I can't tell whether it's a recognised bug.

Subsidiary question: since I would prefer to spend time on Haskell rather
then
on the package system, would it be quicker (in days, not in milliseconds :-)
to use nhc98 or Hugs98-Sep2006, obsolete though they are?

All advice gratefully received,

thanks,

-David

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