id	summary	reporter	owner	description	type	status	priority	milestone	component	version	resolution	keywords	cc	os	architecture	failure	difficulty	testcase	blockedby	blocking	related
1799	Retain export-list order in ModIface, use it in :browse	guest		"while trying to write a test for an extension of :browse, i encountered an issue with the existing functionality: the order of names is not stable, making it difficult to write meaningful tests for :browse. 

a reduced test case & output are appended below, showing that output order is affected by prior usage, in both 6.6.1 and HEAD.

i would prefer for the items to appear in source order, but at the point :browse gets a hand on them, source location information might not be available; sorting by Name would be random due to uniqueIds, and lexicographic sorting would be confusing to users (spreading related items all over the alphabet, instead of keeping the order in which they appear in source and documentation). 

is there a way to keep the items in source order, within each module (modules themselves could be sorted lexicographically)? note that alphabetically sorting names would very much be a last resort!

{{{
--------------------------------------- testing :browse
$ cat y.hs
import Prelude()
import Data.Maybe(catMaybes,mapMaybe)

$ cat .ghci
:t Data.Maybe.mapMaybe

$ ghcii.sh --version
The Glorious Glasgow Haskell Compilation System, version 6.6.1

$ /cygdrive/c/fptools/ghc/compiler/stage2/ghc-inplace --interactive --version
The Glorious Glasgow Haskell Compilation System, version 6.9.20071019

$ (echo :l y.hs;echo :browse '*Main') | ghcii.sh -v0
Data.Maybe.mapMaybe :: (a -> Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]
mapMaybe :: (a -> Data.Maybe.Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]
catMaybes :: [Data.Maybe.Maybe a] -> [a]

$ (echo :l y.hs;echo :browse '*Main') | ghcii.sh -v0 -ignore-dot-ghci
catMaybes :: [Data.Maybe.Maybe a] -> [a]
mapMaybe :: (a -> Data.Maybe.Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]

$ (echo :l y.hs;echo :browse '*Main') | /cygdrive/c/fptools/ghc/compiler/stage2/ghc-inplace --inter
active  -v0
Data.Maybe.mapMaybe :: (a -> Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]
mapMaybe :: (a -> Data.Maybe.Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]
catMaybes :: [Data.Maybe.Maybe a] -> [a]

$ (echo :l y.hs;echo :browse '*Main') | /cygdrive/c/fptools/ghc/compiler/stage2/ghc-inplace --inter
active  -v0 -ignore-dot-ghci
catMaybes :: [Data.Maybe.Maybe a] -> [a]
mapMaybe :: (a -> Data.Maybe.Maybe b) -> [a] -> [b]
}}}"	bug	closed	normal	7.2.1	GHCi	6.6.1	fixed		claus.reinke@…	Unknown/Multiple	Unknown/Multiple	None/Unknown	Unknown