If you're already using or comfortable with
another Scheme implementation, though, there's no compelling reason to switch.
-If for some reason you have problems with Racket, other implementations you could
-try are
-[Chicken](http://www.call-cc.org),
-[Gauche](http://practical-scheme.net/gauche),
-or [Chibi](https://code.google.com/p/chibi-scheme). The later in that list you go, the more likely it
-is that you'll have to compile the software yourself. (Thus Mac users will need Xcode.)
-Racket stands to Scheme in something like the relation Firefox stands to HTML. It's one program (or platform) among others for working with the Scheme language; and many of those programs (or web browsers) permit different extensions, have small variations, and so on.
+Another good Scheme implementation is [Chicken](http://www.call-cc.org). For our purposes, this is in some respects
+superior to Racket, and in other respects inferior. If you have any issues with installing or using Racket, you could
+try this out instead. You might even want to install both.
+
+<!--
+Racket doesn't have R7RS-small, and won't anytime soon.
+Other R7RS-friendly: [Gauche](http://practical-scheme.net/gauche), [Chibi](https://code.google.com/p/chibi-scheme).
+-->
+
+Racket and Chicken stand to Scheme in something like the relation Firefox stands to HTML. They are two programs (or platforms) among others for working with the Scheme language; and many of those programs (or web browsers) permit different extensions, have small variations, and so on.
Racket has several components. The two most visible components for us are a command-line interpreter named "racket" and a teaching-friendly editor/front-end named "DrRacket". You will probably be working primarily or wholly in the latter.
<!-- "racket" used to be mzscheme, "DrRacket" used to be DrScheme -->
Go to <http://racket-lang.org/download/>. Download and install the option for your system, most likely "Macintosh
OS X (Intel 64-bit)".
+ After you copy the files from the Installation disk to your /Applications folder, I think it's helpful to do these additional steps. In a Terminal, type:
+
+ sudo ln -s /Applications/Racket*/DrRacket.app /Applications/
+ sudo ln -s /Applications/Racket*/bin/racket /usr/bin/
+
+ Then you can launch Racket either by double-clicking the DrRacket icon in
+ your Applications folder (this gives you the GUI interface); or by typing
+ `racket` in a Terminal (this gives you the command-line version).
+
+* **To instead install Chicken Scheme on Mac without MacPorts**
+
+ Here are the exact steps I just verified worked. Note that I *first installed the Haskell Platform*, described further down this page; that installed some developer tools that were needed to build and install Chicken. If you don't know how to open a Terminal, move between directories, copy / rename / delete files and so on, then you're probably best off not doing this. You could break something.
+
+ 1. Go to <http://code.call-cc.org>, and click the "Source code" link near the top. Current version is 4.9.0.1, released November 2014. This should fetch a file to your download folder, and will probably automatically unpack that file into a folder, "chicken-4.9.0.1". Click on that folder and press command-C / Copy, then open a Terminal.
+ 2. In the terminal type `cd` followed by a space, then press command-V / Paste. Then press enter. This will move your session into the folder you just downloaded.
+ 3. Type `less README` and read that file.
+ 4. Type `sudo mkdir -p /usr/local`
+ 5. Type `make PLATFORM=macosx XCODE_DEVELOPER= XCODE_TOOL_PATH=/usr/bin`
+
+ The options starting with `XCODE_` are to tell the Chicken build scripts that I've got the developer tools installed in my main system, rather than as part of Xcode. (That's where the Haskell Platform installer put them.) Continuing:
+
+ 6. Wait a while while Chicken builds.
+ 7. If it finishes with no errors, then type `sudo make PLATFORM=macosx XCODE_TOOL_PATH=/usr/bin install`. This will prompt you for your account password, and then install Chicken underneath your `/usr/local` directory.
+ 8. At this point you can type `which chicken`. If it gives you an answer of "/usr/local/bin/chicken", then skip to the next step. Else you should type `echo 'export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH' >> ~/.bashrc`, then exit and restart your Terminal session.
+ 9. In your terminal, type `chicken-install -sudo r7rs datatype matchable monad`. This will download, build, and install a few extensions (Chicken calls them "eggs") relevant to ideas we'll be working with in this course.
+
* **To install on Mac with MacPorts**
Unfortunately, MacPorts doesn't have Racket itself available. It only has an older version from when they still called
more generally; but you can assume that what we're talking about always works more
specifically in OCaml.
-It's helpful if in addition to OCaml you also install the Findlib add-on.
-This will make it easier to install additional add-ons further down the road.
-However, if you're not able to get that working, don't worry about it much.
+It's helpful if in addition to OCaml you also install the Findlib add-on and/or the OPAM "package manager."
+These will make it easier to install additional add-ons further down the road.
+However, if you're not able to get them working, don't worry about it much.
The current version of OCaml is 4.02.1 (released October 2014).
+<!-- 3.12.1 July 2011; 4.00.1 Oct 2012; 4.01.0 Sept 2013; 4.02.0 Aug 2014; 4.02.1 Oct 2014 -->
-* *Another instruction page focuses on [OPAM](http://ocaml.org/docs/install.html), also [this](https://opam.ocaml.org).*
-
-* *[More details about installing OCaml on Macs, if needed](http://cocan.org/getting_started_with_ocaml_on_mac_os_x)*
* In your web browser:
even if you don't know what MinGW or Cygwin are.
Some features of this require Cygwin, but it looks like
it should mostly work even for users without Cygwin.
- At the time of this writing, only an installer for the previous
- version of OCaml (3.11.0, from January 2010) is available.
+ At the time of this writing, only an installer for an earlier
+ version of OCaml (4.01.0, from September 2013) is available.
To install the Findlib add-on, you must have the
Cygwin system installed. We assume few of you do,
* **To install on Mac without MacPorts**
+ *Instructions coming*
+
+* *Another instruction page focuses on [OPAM](http://ocaml.org/docs/install.html), also [this](https://opam.ocaml.org).*
+
+* *[More details about installing OCaml on Macs, if needed](http://mirror.ocamlcore.org/wiki.cocan.org/getting_started_with_ocaml_on_mac_os_x)*
+
+ <!--
To install OCaml 3.12 (just released this summer), go to
<http://caml.inria.fr/download.en.html>
and download and install the "Binary distribution for Mac OS X"
This will build an installer package which you should be able to
double-click and install.
+ -->
* **To install on Mac with MacPorts**
- You can install the previous version of OCaml (3.11.2,
- from January 2010), together with the Findlib add-on, by opening a Terminal
- and typing:
+ You can install the current version of OCaml (4.02.1, from October 2014),
+ together with the Findlib add-on and OPAM package manager, by opening a Terminal and typing:
- sudo port install ocaml caml-findlib
+ sudo port install ocaml caml-findlib opam
As with Scheme, it's helpful to also have rlwrap installed, and to start OCaml as `rlwrap ocaml`. This gives
you a nice history of the commands you've already typed, which you can scroll up and down in with your
Use your packaging system, for example, open a Terminal and
type:
- sudo apt-get install ocaml ocaml-findlib
+ sudo apt-get install ocaml ocaml-findlib opam
- That will install a version of OCaml and the Findlib add-on.
+ That will install a version of OCaml and the Findlib add-on and OPAM package manager.
If for some reason you can't get OCaml through your
packaging system, you can go to
If you can't get findlib through your packaging system, you'll
need to download it from
- <http://download.camlcity.org/download/findlib-1.2.6.tar.gz>.
+ <http://download.camlcity.org/download/findlib-1.5.5.tar.gz>.
and use gcc to compile it yourself. If you don't know how to
do that, you probably don't want to attempt this.
Here are the INSTALL notes:
Like Scheme, Haskell has a couple of different implementations. The dominant one, and the one we recommend you install, is called [GHC](https://wiki.haskell.org/GHC), short for "Glasgow Haskell Compiler". To install this on your machine, there are a couple of different strategies. It's helpful to understand some lingo as you begin this process:
* As mentioned, **GHC** is the main Haskell engine or compiler you'll be installing. The current version is 7.8.4, from December 2014.
-* **gcc** and **llvm/clang** and **Xcode** and **MinGW** are names for other compilers on different systems. Oftentimes these will be used during the installation process to get GHC up and running. Some of the strategies described below will help you install these if they're not already on your machine.
+* **gcc** and **llvm/clang** and **Xcode** and **MinGW** are names for other compilers on various systems. Oftentimes these will be used during the installation process to get GHC up and running. Some of the strategies described below will help you install these if they're not already on your machine.
* **alex** and **happy** and **haddock** are names of various Haskell helper programs that GHC uses to get up and running.
-* **cabal** is a "package manager" for Haskell. It allows you to install libraries or extensions that other people have built. (Usually those are published at the [Hackage](http://hackage.haskell.org) web site. Some of these are experimental and may not always work; others are quite fundamental and are almost de facto parts of what people expect in a Haskell system.
+* **[Cabal](https://www.haskell.org/cabal)** is a "package manager" for Haskell. It allows you to install libraries or extensions that other people have built. (Usually those are published at the [Hackage](https://hackage.haskell.org) web site.) Some of these are experimental and may not always work; others are quite fundamental and are almost de facto parts of what people expect in a Haskell system.
* **[Haskell Platform](https://www.haskell.org/platform)** is a standard bundle that includes a fixed version of GHC, plus fixed versions of some of the most popular libraries or extensions. This is updated once or twice a year. The current version is 2014.2.0.0, from August 2014. It includes GHC version 7.8.3.
-The easiest way to get up and running with Haskell/GHC is to install the Haskell Platform. Here's how to do that on Ubuntu or Debian Linux:
+The easiest way to get up and running with Haskell/GHC is to install the Haskell Platform. Here's how to do that **on Windows**:
-* In a Terminal, type `sudo apk-get install haskell-platform`.
+* Go to <https://www.haskell.org/platform/windows.html> and follow the instructions. It looks like this process will automatically install the MinGW compiler needed to get this build of Haskell running on Windows.
-On a Mac without MacPorts:
+On **Mac without MacPorts**:
-* \<Instructions>
-* <https://github.com/pittsburgh-haskell/haskell-installation>
+* Go to <https://www.haskell.org/platform/mac.html> and follow the instructions. This requires Mac OS X 10.6 / Snow Leopard or later; but there is a link to an earlier version of Haskell Platform, that's built for Mac OS X 10.5 / Leopard. During the installation, you may be prompted to install "the command line developer tools"; this is a portion of what Apple bundles together with Xcode (mentioned above on this page). The installer will take care of getting these for you if you give it permission.
-On a Mac with MacPorts:
+On **Mac with MacPorts**:
-* \<Instructions>
+* In a Terminal, type `sudo port install haskell-platform`.
-On Windows:
+On **Ubuntu or Debian Linux**:
-* \<Instructions>
+* In a Terminal, type `sudo apt-get install haskell-platform`.
-* It's useful to know about the general [Haskell wiki](htps://wiki.haskell.org) (not restricted to just GHC). They have a [Getting Started](https://wiki.haskell.org/Haskell_in_5_steps) page, which also recommends that you install the Haskell Platform.
+If any of the instructions above don't work, then you can try alternative instructions for [Mac](http://new-www.haskell.org/downloads/osx) or [Windows](http://new-www.haskell.org/downloads/windows) or [Ubuntu](http://new-www.haskell.org/downloads/linux). After installing the software, open a Terminal and type `cabal update && cabal install alex happy`. <!-- If typing `which ghci` in a Terminal doesn't give you any reply, you may need to type `echo 'export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH' >> ~/.bashrc`, then exit and restart your Terminal session. --> Note that this method doesn't install all the extensions that are part of the Haskell Platform, but only the core pieces of GHC. You can use Cabal to download and manage any extra extensions you turn out to need, down the road.
-* <new-www.haskell.org/downloads>
+It's useful to know about the general [Haskell wiki](https://wiki.haskell.org) (not restricted to just GHC). They have a [Getting Started](https://wiki.haskell.org/Haskell_in_5_steps) page, which also recommends that you install the Haskell Platform.