Fix a nasty recursive loop in typechecking interface files

[ghc-hetmet.git] / compiler / iface / LoadIface.lhs

diff --git a/compiler/iface/LoadIface.lhs b/compiler/iface/LoadIface.lhs
index 8625a1a..5d75259 100644 (file)
--- a/compiler/iface/LoadIface.lhs
+++ b/compiler/iface/LoadIface.lhs
@@ -323,7 +323,27 @@ loadDecl ignore_prags mod (_version, decl)
        ; thing <- forkM doc $ do { bumpDeclStats main_name
                                  ; tcIfaceDecl ignore_prags decl }
 
-       -- Populate the type environment with the implicitTyThings too
+       -- Populate the type environment with the implicitTyThings too.
+       -- 
+       -- Note [Tricky iface loop]
+       -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+       -- The delicate point here is that 'mini-env' should be
+       -- buildable from 'thing' without demanding any of the things 'forkM'd 
+       -- by tcIfaceDecl.  For example
+       --      class C a where { data T a; op :: T a -> Int }
+       -- We return the bindings
+       --      [("C", <cls>), ("T", lookup env "T"), ("op", lookup env "op")]
+       -- The call (lookup env "T") must return the tycon T without first demanding
+       -- op; because getting the latter will look up T, hence loop.
+       --
+       -- Of course, there is no reason in principle why (lookup env "T") should demand
+       -- anything do to with op, but take care: 
+       --      (a) implicitTyThings, and 
+       --      (b) getOccName of all the things returned by implicitThings, 
+       -- must not depend on any of the nested type-checks
+       -- 
+       -- All a bit too finely-balanced for my liking.
+
        ; let mini_env = mkOccEnv [(getOccName t, t) | t <- implicitTyThings thing]
              lookup n = case lookupOccEnv mini_env (getOccName n) of
                           Just thing -> thing