Hi Robert,
> Working on Guix, I encountered the following: > > Within a guix checkout, I edited gnu/packages/haskell.scm, accidentally > making a Haskell comment: > > (arguments > `(#:tests? #f)) -- sporadic failure: > https://github.com/fpco/streaming-commons/issues/49 > > Then I tried to keep working on my in-development package, and was able to > trace > the `guix build` error back to the following: > > $ ./pre-inst-env guild compile ../modules/postgrest.scm > ;;; note: source file /home/rob/guix/gnu/packages/haskell.scm > ;;; newer than compiled /home/rob/guix/gnu/packages/haskell.go > ;;; note: source file /home/rob/guix/gnu/packages/haskell.scm > ;;; newer than compiled > /run/current-system/profile/lib/guile/2.2/site-ccache/gnu/packages/haskell.go > ice-9/boot-9.scm:752:25: In procedure dispatch-exception: > Syntax error: > unknown location: package: invalid field specifier in form —- This error is produced by the “package” macro, which is of this form: (package (field value) (another-field its-value) …) The macro has a number of valid field names and it tries to do some simple validation. That’s where the error comes from. When “--” is encountered it is in the position of a field, so the macro tries to be helpful and reports that “--” is not a valid way to specify a field. This error message is not produced by Guile. > There are number of ways the error output could be improved. Ideally, I’d > like to see the offending line of gnu/packages/haskell.scm pin-pointed, > and/or the start of the enclosing package definition. I agree that this would be nice. Let’s move this to the Guix bug tracker. -- Ricardo