Installing

OK, so let's assume that you have unpacked your chosen bundles into a scratch directory `fptools'. What next? Well, you will at least need to run the `configure' script by changing your directory to `fptools' and typing `./configure'. That should convert `Makefile.in' to `Makefile'.

You can now either start using the tools in-situ without going through any installation process, just type `make in-place' to set the tools up for this (where `make' is GNU make - you might have to type `gmake' to get it). You'll also want to add the path which `make' will now echo to your `PATH' environment variable. This option is useful if you simply want to try out the package and/or you don't have the necessary priviledges (or inclination) to properly install the tools locally. Note that if you do decide to install the package `properly' at a later date, you have to go through the installation steps that follows.

To install an `fptools' package, you'll have to do the following:

1. Edit the `Makefile' and check the settings of the following variables:

   `platform'

   the platform you are going to install for.

   `bindir'

   the directory in which to install user-invokable binaries.

   `libdir'

   the directory in which to install platform-dependent support files.

   `datadir'

   the directory in which to install platform-independent support files.

   `infodir'

   the directory in which to install Emacs info files.

   `htmldir'

   the directory in which to install HTML documentation.

   `dvidir'

   the directory in which to install DVI documentation.

   The values for these variables can be set through invocation of the `configure' script that comes with the distribution, but doing an optical diff to see if the values match your expectations is always a Good Idea. Instead of running `configure', it is perfectly OK to copy `Makefile.in' to `Makefile' and set all these variables directly yourself. But do it right!
2. Run `make install'. This should work with ordinary Unix `make' -- no need for fancy stuff like GNU `make'.
3. `rehash' (t?csh users), so your shell will see the new stuff in your bin directory.
4. Once done, test your "installation" as suggested in section See section Test that GHC seems to be working. Be sure to use a `-v' option, so you can see exactly what pathnames it's using. If things don't work as expected, check the list of know pitfalls section See section Known pitfalls in building Glasgow Haskell.

When installing the user-invokable binaries, this installation procedure will install GHC as `ghc-x.xx' where `x.xx' is the version number of GHC. It will also make a link (in the binary installation directory) from `ghc' to `ghc-x.xx'. If you install multiple versions of GHC then the last one "wins", and "`ghc'" will invoke the last one installed. You can change this manually if you want. But regardless, `ghc-x.xx' should always invoke GHC version `x.xx'.