[web-devel] Odd "Ambiguous type variable `a0' in the constraint:" error (with Yesod)

[Mathew de Detrich]

Ok I have found the source issue, in my case it was an issue that ended up
turning into how the modules for my Webserver is organized, and that
compiler error (about an ambiguous type) occurred because my main webserver
datatype was not instantiated yet in that module (using where aproot).
In essence there were 2 issues

The original problem (with the ambigous type error) was fixed by just simply
providing a type (in this case RepHtml) to the function definition

Once this was done, the second problem occured due to using splicing with
Template Haskell (from mkYesod). What I was attempting to do is to seperate
the handlers (of the form get/post****R) from the routes created with
mkYesod. This wasn't originally an issue until I tried to create widgets,
and it was due to the use of defaultLayout.

Handlers using defaultLayout needs to be placed *after* the instantiation of
yesod (where you do instance yesod *** where aproot *****) however, the
mkYesod requires the handlers (of the form get/post****R) to be placed
before the routes. Handlers without a defaultLayout do not require the Yesod
instantiation to compile (which is why the error never came up before, I
never used defaultLayout prior to attempting to use widgets). This created
some horrific cyclic module dependably, where I was forced to use hs-boot
files along with creating a dummy module which just contains the instance
Yesod ** where ****** by itself. Splitting off that instantiation into
a separate module was required since hs-boot files don't work with functions
that do splicing due to template haskell

Of course if GHC supported cyclic module dependencies out of the box (and
support for function splices with template haskell in those hs-boot files
are added) then this would have been much less painful, is there any plan to
support automatic creating of hs-boot files to GHC anytime soon?

On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 11:00 PM, Michael Snoyman <michael at snoyman.com>wrote:

> Without seeing the actual code that's causing the breakage, there's
> not much I can tell you. (If you'd like me to take a look off-list,
> feel free to send me a private email.) My best recommendation is to
> try putting a type signature on getRootR.
>
> As a general issue: polymorphic Hamlet is a very convenient feature,
> but I think it leads to too much complexity in the type system. I've
> added some code for non-polymorphic Hamlet to the Github repo and will
> be releasing it as its own module (Text.Hamlet.NonPoly) in the next
> release. Assuming all goes well, it will be replacing the current
> Hamlet. That essentially means that you'll need to replace your code
> with something like:
>
> getRootR = defaultLayout $ do
>    setTitle "Polymorphic Hamlet"
>     addHtml [$html|<p>I was added with addHtml|]
>     addHamlet [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addHamlet|]
>     addWidget [$whamlet|<p>I was added with addWidget|]
>
> And just to make everyone curious: I've also added i18n support to
> non-poly Hamlet. I've got a long train ride on Tuesday, and I'm
> planning on documenting it then.
>
> Michael
>
> On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 6:50 AM, Mathew de Detrich <deteego at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > Ok so I have a problem that was described here
> > (http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lang.haskell.web/1431) in regards
> to
> > returning a  "Ambiguous type variable `a0' in the constraint error" when
> > compiling. Originally I thought it was due to the way I was coding that
> part
> > of the code (or to be more accurate the code specifically for creating
> the
> > so called widgets with addHTML/addWidget,addHamlet). So I copied the
> example
> > code given here exactly (http://www.yesodweb.com/book/example-widgets).
> > Compiling this worked fine, so at the next point I changed the definition
> > of getRootR to
> > getRootR = defaultLayout $ wrapper $ do
> >     setTitle "Polymorphic Hamlet"
> >     addHtml [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addHtml|]
> >     addHamlet [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addHamlet|]
> >     addWidget [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addWidget|]
> > and then to
> > getRootR = defaultLayout $ do
> >     setTitle "Polymorphic Hamlet"
> >     addHtml [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addHtml|]
> >     addHamlet [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addHamlet|]
> >     addWidget [$hamlet|<p>I was added with addWidget|]
> > Both times compiled fine, so the issue wasn't what I originally thought
> that
> > it was (as described
> > in http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lang.haskell.web/1431). The
> problem
> > is, that when I use the above example code in my WebServer, I get this
> > Ambigious type error when compiling (even though I have set up the route
> the
> > exact same way). Unfortunatley I can't provide the code for my webserver,
> > since its commercially owned (and it would be pointless because its just
> > renamed variables, but otherwise its the same), so does anyone have any
> > ideas what could possibly cause such an error (such as a missing/extra
> > import or some package or something), or possibly some missing instances?
> > Also sorry for creating another mailing list, but its a different issue
> then
> > what I thought it was originally (and I also wanted to put it on
> > haskell-cafe since its a more general issue)
> > _______________________________________________
> > web-devel mailing list
> > web-devel at haskell.org
> > http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/web-devel
> >
> >
>
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