Re: Xmonad and ghc-xmonad-contrib

[Eric Bavier]

On Thu, 05 Nov 2015 15:29:28 +0100
Paul van der Walt <address@hidden> wrote:

> Hello Guix,
> 
> I'm writing to ask how to configure Xmonad on GuixSD.  I've got GuixSD
> (version 0.9.0 ^^) installed and working in a VM, so that's cool.  I've
> also got the following in my config.scm:
> 
> (packages (cons* xfce
>                  nss-certs  ; for HTTPS access
>                  xmobar     ; added in my local git-checkout of Guix
>                  openssh
>                  ghc
>                  xmonad
>                  ghc-network
>                  ghc-xmonad-contrib
>                  %base-packages))
> 
> This is nice, because at the login screen i can select xmonad as my
> window manager.  However, it cannot compile my ~/.xmonad/xmonad.hs file,
> since (among many others) it gives the following error:
> 
> xmonad.hs:35:8:
>         Could not find module `XMonad.Layout.NoBorders'
>         Use -v to see a list of the files searched for.

This is a known shortfall in our current xmonad.  See
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2015-09/msg00295.html

I appreciate the xmobar patches you sent, btw.  It would certainly be
nice if one could configure their xmonad to use it. :)

> Et cetera.  I think this is because of the fact that ghc-xmonad-contrib
> isn't properly made available.  See the output of `ghc-pkg list` run as
> my normal user:
> 
> /gnu/store/1iwl222h2qw80fyr578sdjdki0pbcjm0-ghc-7.10.2/lib/ghc-7.10.2/package.conf.d:
>     Cabal-1.22.4.0
>     array-0.5.1.0
>     base-4.8.1.0
>     bin-package-db-0.0.0.0
>     binary-0.7.5.0
>     rts-1.0
>     bytestring-0.10.6.0
>     containers-0.5.6.2
>     deepseq-1.4.1.1
>     directory-1.2.2.0
>     filepath-1.4.0.0
>     (ghc-7.10.2)
>     ghc-prim-0.4.0.0
>     haskeline-0.7.2.1
>     hoopl-3.10.0.2
>     hpc-0.6.0.2
>     integer-gmp-1.0.0.0
>     pretty-1.1.2.0
>     process-1.2.3.0
>     template-haskell-2.10.0.0
>     terminfo-0.4.0.1
>     time-1.5.0.1
>     transformers-0.4.2.0
>     unix-2.7.1.0
>     xhtml-3000.2.1
> 
> Notably, the glaring omissions are `network` and `xmonad-contrib`.  Does
> anyone actually use Xmonad, and if so, how did they make it work?  In my
> local Guix-git repository i also tried making all the Xmonad inputs
> propagated but that didn't change anything.

It doesn't change anything because the current ghc doesn't know to look
in user profiles for libraries.

> Any ideas?  Does this mean that the package.conf.d creation is
> completely broken?  Note that if i do `guix package -i ghc-network`,
> that doesn't influence the output of `ghc-pkg list` at all...

And the same for `ghc-pkg list`.  I think the ghc-native-search-path
commit in the 'core-update' branch should fix some/most of these
issues.  If you have some spare cpu cycles, then you could check
whether xmonad configuration works better on that branch.  I just
started a VM build myself.

`~Eric