The Cabal library package ========================= [Cabal home page](http://www.haskell.org/cabal/) If you also want the `cabal` command line program then you need the `cabal-install` package in addition to this library. Installation instructions for the Cabal library =============================================== Installing as a user (no root or administer access) --------------------------------------------------- ghc --make Setup ./Setup configure --user ./Setup build ./Setup install Note the use of the `--user` flag at the configure step. Compiling Setup rather than using `runghc Setup` is much faster and works on Windows. For all packages other than Cabal itself it is fine to use `runghc`. This will install into `$HOME/.cabal/` on unix and into `$Documents and Settings\$User\Application Data\cabal\` on Windows If you want to install elsewhere use the `--prefix=` flag at the configure step. Installing as root / Administrator ---------------------------------- ghc --make Setup ./Setup configure ./Setup build sudo ./Setup install Compiling Setup rather than using `runghc Setup` is much faster and works on Windows. For all packages other than Cabal itself it is fine to use `runghc`. This will install into `/usr/local` on unix and on Windows it will install into `$ProgramFiles/Haskell`. If you want to install elsewhere use the `--prefix=` flag at the configure step. Working with older versions of GHC and Cabal ============================================ It is recommended just to leave any pre-existing version of Cabal installed. In particular it is *essential* to keep the version that came with GHC itself since other installed packages need it (eg the "ghc" api package). Prior to GHC 6.4.2 however, GHC didn't deal particularly well with having multiple versions of packages installed at once. So if you are using GHC 6.4.1 or older and you have an older version of Cabal installed, you probably just want to remove it: ghc-pkg unregister Cabal or if you had Cabal installed just for your user account then: ghc-pkg unregister Cabal --user The `filepath` dependency ========================= Cabal now uses the `filepath` package so that must be installed first. GHC-6.6.1 and later come with `filepath` however earlier versions do not by default. If you do not already have `filepath` then you need to install it. You can use any existing version of Cabal to do that. If you have neither Cabal or filepath then it is slightly harder but still possible. Unpack Cabal and filepath into separate directories. For example: tar -xzf filepath-1.1.0.0.tar.gz tar -xzf Cabal-1.6.0.0.tar.gz # rename to make the following instructions simpler: mv filepath-1.1.0.0/ filepath/ mv Cabal-1.6.0.0/ Cabal/ cd Cabal ghc -i../filepath -cpp --make Setup.hs -o ../filepath/setup cd ../filepath/ ./setup configure --user ./setup build ./setup install This installs filepath so you are then in a position to install Cabal by the normal method. More Information ================ Please see the web site for the [user guide] and API documentation. There is some more information available on the [development wiki]. [user guide]: http://www.haskell.org/cabal/ [development wiki]: http://hackage.haskell.org/trac/hackage/ Bugs ======= Please report bugs and wish-list items in our [bug tracker]. [bug tracker]: http://hackage.haskell.org/trac/hackage/ Your Help --------- To help us in the next round of development work it would be enormously helpful to know from our users what their most pressing problems are with Cabal and Hackage. You probably have a favourite Cabal bug or limitation. Take a look at our [bug tracker]. Make sure the problem is reported there and properly described. Comment on the ticket to tell us how much of a problem the bug is for you. Add yourself to the ticket's cc list so we can discuss requirements and keep you informed on progress. For feature requests it is very helpful if there is a description of how you would expect to interact with the new feature. Code ======= You can get the code from the web page; the version control system we use is very open and welcoming to new developers. You can get the main development branch: > darcs get --partial http://darcs.haskell.org/cabal and you can get the stable 1.6 branch: > darcs get --partial http://darcs.haskell.org/cabal-branches/cabal-1.6 Credits ======= Cabal Coders (in alphabetical order): - Krasimir Angelov - Bjorn Bringert - Duncan Coutts - Isaac Jones - David Himmelstrup (Lemmih) - Simon Marlow - Ross Patterson - Thomas Schilling - Martin Sjögren - Malcolm Wallace - and nearly 30 other people have contributed occasional patches Cabal spec: - Isaac Jones - Simon Marlow - Ross Patterson - Simon Peyton Jones - Malcolm Wallace