[Nix-dev] Installing a Haskell environment using Nix on Fbsd (bootstrapping problems)

[Eelco Dolstra]

Hi,

Boudewijn Ector wrote:

> user-thrown exception: `cannot bootstrap GHC on this platform'
> 
> Can someone give me a clue about how to solve this problem?

The problem is that to build GHC, you need a GHC binary.  In Nixpkgs on Linux 
(i686 and x86_64) and on Mac OS X, this requirement is met by downloading a 
prebuilt GHC binary tarball.  For FreeBSD the same thing should be done.  Have a 
look at pkgs/development/compilers/ghc/boot.nix, which defines the binary 
packages to use for each platform.  You can add a case for FreeBSD if you can 
find a binary package.  Unfortunately, the GHC download pages don't seem to list 
a binary tarball for i686-freebsd...

Bonus points for whoever figures out how to build GHC from bootstrapped C 
sources :-)

-- 
Eelco Dolstra | http://www.st.ewi.tudelft.nl/~dolstra/