- The Glasgow Haskell Compiler -- version 2.04
+ The Glasgow Haskell Compiler -- version 3.02
==============================================
We are pleased to announce a new release of the Glasgow Haskell
-Compiler (GHC), version 2.04. Source distribution is freely available
-via the World-Wide Web and anon. FTP; details below.
+Compiler (GHC), version 3.02. The source distribution is freely
+available via the World-Wide Web and through anon. FTP; details below.
Haskell is "the" standard lazy functional programming language; the
current language version is 1.4, agreed in April, 1997. Haskell
-related information is available from the Haskell home page at:
+related information is available from the Haskell home page at
http://haskell.org/
-
+ What's new
=============
-Release 2.04 represent work done through May '97; highlights include:
-
- * Data constructors can now have polymophic fields, and ordinary
- functions can have polymoprhic arguments. Details on
-
- http://www.cse.ogi.edu/~simonpj/quantification.html
-
- Existential types coming, but not done yet.
-
- * Pattern guards implemented, see
-
- http://www.cse.ogi.edu/~simonpj/guards.html
-
- * Compiler can now compile itself (i.e., no real dependence on
- the Haskell 1.2 compiler anymore (version 0.29)).
+GHC 3.02 is a source-only release. Major news items:
- * Faster compilation
- Compilation speeds has improved since 2.02, although it still slower
- than GHC-0.29, the Good Old Compiler. (the gap is narrowing, though!)
-
- * Code quality is better, the simplifier and inlining machinery has been
- refurbished. Not sure how much better.
-
- * powerpc-ibm-aix is now a supported GHC platform, due to the
- Heroic Efforts of Andr\'e Santos <alms@di.ufpe.br>.
-
- * It has been tested against a large suite of (mostly) Haskell 1.2
- programs (the NoFib suite). Bunch of bugs related to new
- Haskell 1.4 has been weeded out.
-
- * A couple of Haskell 1.4 features are still incompletely supported,
- notably polymorphic strictness annotations, and Unicode.
-
-Please see the release notes for a complete discussion of What's New.
+ * A new specialiser,
+ * A new unsafeCoerce# primitive.
+ * A NOINLINE pragma.
+ * Many bugs fixed, including several performance-related ones,
+GHC 3.02 produces the fastest code since 0.29, but there's still
+plenty of tuning to do.
+ Mailing lists
================
+ How to get it
================
-The easy way is to go to the WWW GHC distribution page, which should
-be self-explanatory:
+The easy way is to go to the WWW page, which should be
+self-explanatory:
- ftp://ftp.dcs.gla.ac.uk/pub/haskell/glasgow/README.html
+ http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/fp/software/ghc/
Once you have the distribution, please follow the pointers in the
README file to find all of the documentation about this release. NB:
======================
To compile up this source-only release, you need a machine with 16+MB
-memory, GNU C (`gcc'), `perl' plus a version of GHC installed (either
-version 0.29 or 2.02/2.03). We have seen GHC work on these platforms:
+memory, GNU C (`gcc'), `perl' plus a version of GHC installed (version
+2.10 at least). We have seen GHC work on these platforms:
- * alpha-dec-osf2
+ * alpha-dec-osf{2,3}
* hppa1.1-hp-hpux{9,10}
* sparc-sun-{sunos4,solaris2}
* mips-sgi-irix{5,6}
* i386-unknown-{linux,solaris2,freebsd,cygwin32}.
- * powerpc-ibm-aix
+ * {rs6000,powerpc}-ibm-aix
Similar platforms should work with minimal hacking effort. The installer's
-guide included in distribution gives a complete run-down of what-ports-work.
+guide included in distribution gives a complete run-down of what-ports-work;
+an on-line version can be found at
+
+ http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/fp/software/ghc/3.02/installation_guide/installing_toc.html
+EOF