wasm artifact doesn't exist (anymore?)

[phadej]

Error: [GHCup-05841] Download failed: Process "curl" with arguments ["-fL", "-o",
                                                "/home/phadej/.ghcup/tmp/ghcup-0e8c66d3020a1a24/ghc-9.6.2.20230523-x86_64-linux-alpine3_12-cross_wasm32-wasi-release+fully_static.tar.xz.tmp",
                                                "https://gitlab.haskell.org/api/v4/projects/3223/jobs/1530829/artifacts/ghc-x86_64-linux-alpine3_12-cross_wasm32-wasi-release+fully_static.tar.xz"] failed with exit code 22.

[hasufell]

Yeah, gitlab is constantly busted and also broke all GHC nightlies. There's no hope.

It's not my responsibility.

@chreekat

[hasufell]

Ah, we have stable bindists here https://raw.githubusercontent.com/amesgen/ghc-wasm-bindists/main/meta.json

@amesgen

[hasufell]

Fixed

[hasufell]

Also updated bindist documentation: https://www.haskell.org/ghcup/guide/#cross-support

[chreekat]

Note that GHC HQ does not provide wasm bindists yet, as it is not considered stable enough yet. Does GHCup make that clear to users?

Or could GHC HQ make that more clear?

In other words, I do think it's GHCup's responsibility, because GHCup is of its own initiative augmenting GHC in a way that GHC can't support right now.

[hasufell]

Note that GHC HQ does not provide wasm bindists yet

That's not the point really. We provide all sorts of bindists not sanctioned by GHC HQ and we really don't care.

The point is that gitlab is configured to constantly purge artifacts and is an unreliable source for downloads.

[chreekat]

No, that's not the point. Although it's very true and I wish nobody outside of GHC devs relied on the nightly pipeline, even if it was totally reliable.

The point is that you broadcast a certain level of reliability and availability for GHC that is not based on reality and contradicts GHC's own statements. Then people get surprised when something breaks, reducing trust in both GHC and GHCup. This makes it harder for GHC to actually focus on the bugs it does have in the platforms it does claim to support. Nobody's perfect here; all software has bugs. But indicating that something does work, when we know it doesn't, is the problem.

[hasufell]

This is a false statement.

Cross bindists are marked as experimental. Please see the readme: https://github.com/haskell/ghcup-metadata#metadata-variants-distribution-channels

---

However, GHCup doesn't really care whether bindists are provided by upstream. We have our own QA.

[chreekat]

I disagree it is a false statement, but I guess this is the end of productive discussion on this issue. I will rest now.

[hasufell]

I disagree it is a false statement, but I guess this is the end of productive discussion on this issue. I will rest now.

Please elaborate if you make accusations that GHCup conveys incorrect expectations while these are clearly documented in the metadata readme and further described in the distribution policies.

[chreekat]

The fact that GHCup distributes a bindist of the wasm cross compiler at all means it is broadcasting a level of reliability that does not exist. Your first response on this issue puts the blame for this unreliability on GHC, when it was GHCup's own initiative that made a bindist available in the first place.

Your policy of providing bindists that upstream does not support is in conflict with your policy of maintaining a good relationship with upstream providers. How you handle that is up to you, but I don't think conjuring up reliability for unsupported platforms is making it any easier.

[chreekat]

For what it's worth, I think it's good that we disagree on which platforms to support. I am too conservative and would rather reduce availability and focus on making things perfect . An extreme version of that would be to drop support for everything except x86_64-linux and focus on getting truly reliable and stable releases running on just that. But that would be just as bad as claiming "GHC supports all platforms present and future, just use at your own risk". Better to have a balance somehow.

[chreekat]

I propose #152 and haskell/ghcup-hs#928 to highlight the experimental nature of the cross compilers.