"Is cabal-install stable enough yet that GHC should be inflicting it on newbies?"

[atravers]

@andreabedini

What does “newbies” even mean?

How about…“someone not expecting to deal with this garbage in 2024” :

• "Is cabal-install stable enough yet that GHC should be inflicting it on newbies?" - #43 by hasufell

  • cabal install --lib is a re-introduction of cabal hell

• Separate `cabal install --lib` into own command (cabal env) · Issue #6481 · haskell/cabal · GitHub

  The semantics of cabal install --lib continues to confuse people: […]

• Haskell HTTP(S) libraries don't work well - #5 by Liamzy

  […] playing Russian Roulette with cabal install --lib (it’ll blow up in your face sooner or later) […]

• Why is cabal install foo --lib frowned upon?

• Convenience in the Haskell ecosystem - #160 by puppo

  I noticed the new Learn Physics with FP (Haskell) (Walck, December 2022) liberally suggests cabal install and cabal install --lib. And, I thought: ‘oh, maybe that’s ok now, or at least with this.’

  Spoiler? It’s not.

• Ghc can't load a package, even when ghc-pkg listed it - #2 by tomjaguarpaw

  never use cabal install --lib!

  I know cabal itself recommends you try it. Don’t. cabal is very naughty to recommend something that causes a huge bunch of headaches.

• Global configuration of default packages - #3 by jaror

  You can use the (dreaded) cabal install --lib command […]

  • Global configuration of default packages - #12 by tomjaguarpaw

    Yes, we desperately need for cabal to stop recommending cabal install --lib.

• Hidden package — Could not load — how to :set - #18 by igouy

  Now I’m confused. Those instructions seem to use cabal install --lib which you say should not be recommended and is horrendously flaky?

• Could not find module in ghci - #11 by danidiaz

  This is nowadays somewhat discouraged but, if you go to your local project folder, and invoke cabal install --lib ...

• Cabal v2-install failed - #10 by jaror

  […] avoid running cabal install --lib […]

• Strange Cabal behaviour - #7 by yaxu

  Somehow if I run cabal install tidal cabal identifies that I want to install a library, but doesn’t install the library as a library and asks me to re-run the command with a --lib option to do that. I comply but quickly get to the point where my ‘default package environment’ is broken (the same library installed more than once) […]

• How to install modules - #4 by jaror

  cabal install --lib random

  Note that this can cause conflicts (e.g. Cannot satisfy -package-id X11-1.9.1-As84WI1VImVHquwEDPbrTE 14), so the package-env method should be preferred.

• Cannot satisfy -package-id X11-1.9.1-As84WI1VImVHquwEDPbrTE - #9 by jaror

  To avoid this issue in the future you should avoid using cabal install --lib for now.

…could cabal (the tool) actually be worse to use than git?