[Caml-list] Attn: Development Editor, Latest OCaml Weekly News

[Alan Schmitt <alan.schmitt@polytechnique.org>]

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Hello

Here is the latest OCaml Weekly News, for the week of August 09 to 16,
2022.

Table of Contents
─────────────────

Emacs on windows, merlin mode, merlin server remote on linux, tramp, ssh
clangml 4.2.0: OCaml bindings for Clang API (for C and C++ parsing)
opam 2.1.3
Application-specific Improvements to the Ecosystem
Use GitHub CI to build simple binary distribution?
setup-dkml.yml GitHub Actions workflow for distributing binaries
Diskuv OCaml 1.x.x; Windows OCaml installer no longer in preview
Old CWN


Emacs on windows, merlin mode, merlin server remote on linux, tramp, ssh
════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/emacs-on-windows-merlin-mode-merlin-server-remote-on-linux-tramp-ssh/10243/3>


Artem Pianykh said
──────────────────

  I managed to set up Emacs + TRAMP + LSP to do remote development (not
  on the first attempt though, as these things were quite fiddly to set
  up).

  Here's what I got:
  1. You need `opam install ocaml-lsp-server' on the remote machine.
  2. Tell TRAMP to use path from the remote shell: `(add-to-list
     'tramp-remote-path 'tramp-own-remote-path)'
  3. Use [Eglot] as an LSP client. Although, `lsp-mode' claims that they
     support remote servers, I couldn't quite make it work with
     `lsp-mode'. This is what I have in my `init.el':
  ┌────
  │ (require 'eglot)
  │ (add-hook 'tuareg-mode-hook #'eglot-ensure)
  └────


[Eglot] <https://github.com/joaotavora/eglot>


clangml 4.2.0: OCaml bindings for Clang API (for C and C++ parsing)
═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-clangml-4-2-0-ocaml-bindings-for-clang-api-for-c-and-c-parsing/6123/27>


Thierry Martinez announced
──────────────────────────

  `clangml.4.7.0' is now in opam, with the bug fixes/features requested
  by @n47 and some others. All LLVM/Clang versions up to 14.0.x are
  supported, as well as OCaml 5.0. The official repo is now on github:
  <https://github.com/thierry-martinez/clangml> which should ease
  posting issues and pull requests (and should be more convenient than
  discussions on this thread!).

  Support for the upcoming Clang 15 is planned for the next release that
  should happen soon (the development version already supports Clang
  15).


opam 2.1.3
══════════

  Archive: <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-opam-2-1-3/10299/1>


R. Boujbel announced
────────────────────

  We are pleased to announce minor release of opam [2.1.3].

  This opam release consists of [backported] fixes. You’ll find more
  information in the [blog post].

  To upgrade simply run:

  ┌────
  │ bash -c "sh <(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ocaml/opam/master/shell/install.sh) --version 2.1.3"
  └────


[2.1.3] <https://github.com/ocaml/opam/releases/tag/2.1.3>

[backported] <https://github.com/ocaml/opam/issues/5000>

[blog post] <https://opam.ocaml.org/blog/opam-2-1-3>


Application-specific Improvements to the Ecosystem
══════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/application-specific-improvements-to-the-ecosystem/10223/54>


Deep in this thread, Jp R said
──────────────────────────────

  Regarding Perl vs OCaml: An (impressive) implementation of all the
  solutions of the Perl Cookbook in the Objective CAML language (used at
  the time) is available here:
  <http://pleac.sourceforge.net/pleac_ocaml/index.html>

  Re-writing these examples with "modern" code/libraries could be very
  interesting.


Use GitHub CI to build simple binary distribution?
══════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/use-github-ci-to-build-simple-binary-distribution/10303/1>


Christian Lindig asked
──────────────────────

  Is there a recommended way (or example) to build a simple binary
  distribution of an OCaml project using the GitHub CI? I am mostly
  interested in building the executables and packaging them in some
  archive format and make that available for download for different
  architectures.


Guillaume Bury replied
──────────────────────

  I have such a workflow for one of my project, see [this workflow
  file]. It automatically triggers on new releases, builds the project
  with the appropriate compiler (e.g. `flambda'), and uploads the built
  artefact to the release page where it can be downloaded. It currently
  works for both linux and mac (last time I tried it with windows I got
  some errors and I haven't yet had the time to look into that, so i
  don't know if the errors were caused by the workflow, or my project).


[this workflow file]
<https://github.com/Gbury/dolmen/blob/master/.github/workflows/release.yml>


jbeckford also replied
──────────────────────

  That was a weird coincidence that I released a GitHub workflow
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-setup-dkml-yml-github-actions-workflow-for-distributing-binaries/10308>
  for this today. @zozozo's solution is simpler if it works for your
  intended target audience.


Calascibetta Romain replied
───────────────────────────

  I did the same for my little project [bob] but it provides a
  [Cosmopolitan] binary which should run anywhere, see the [workflow]
  and the [last uploaded artifact] :slight_smile:.


[bob] <https://github.com/dinosaure/bob>

[Cosmopolitan] <https://github.com/jart/cosmopolitan>

[workflow]
<https://github.com/dinosaure/bob/blob/main/.github/workflows/esperanto.yml>

[last uploaded artifact]
<https://github.com/dinosaure/bob/actions/runs/2749978142>


setup-dkml.yml GitHub Actions workflow for distributing binaries
════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-setup-dkml-yml-github-actions-workflow-for-distributing-binaries/10308/1>


jbeckford announced
───────────────────

  I am pleased to announce the `v0` release of `setup-dkml.yml`, a
  GitHub Actions workflow for distributing executables or libraries to
  the public:
  • <https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-workflows#readme>

  It is similar to the [GitHub Action setup-ocaml] but has several
  advantages when you are releasing a finished product to the public:
  • On Linux it uses an ancient GLIBC (C library) so your binaries run
    on most Linux distributions without static linking. Statically
    linked binaries are simple to distribute, but can be problematic for
    some copy-left licenses, and makes it difficult for your end-users
    to do security patching of the libraries you linked with.
  • On Windows it uses the Visual Studio compiler rather than the
    non-standard (for Windows) GCC compiler. This is a necessity when
    distributing Windows libraries, and reduces runtime bugs when
    linking native Windows libraries into your OCaml-built Windows
    executables. In addition you can generate Windows 32-bit binaries.
  • On macOS it can build both ARM64 and x86_64 binaries if you use
    [opam-monorepo] to build your project. /Alpha-release caution: This
    works today but only if you hand-edit the .locked file. So only
    advanced users today!/

  Even if you are not releasing to the public, if you are a package
  maintainer you may want to use /both/ `setup-ocaml' and `setup-dkml'
  so that you get additional coverage for Visual Studio and [MSYS2] on
  Windows, and coverage for an older GLIBC on Linux.

  The full comparison matrix available at
  [https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-workflows#readme] is:

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
   `setup-dkml'                          `setup-ocaml'             Consequence                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
  ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
   `dkml-base-compiler'                  `ocaml-base-compiler'     `setup-dkml' *only supports 4.12.1 today*. `setup-ocaml' supports all versions and variants of OCaml                                                                                                                                                                     
   GitHub child workflow                 GitHub Action             `setup-dkml' is more complex to configure, and takes *longer to run*                                                                                                                                                                                                     
   MSVC + MSYS2                          GCC + Cygwin              On Windows `setup-dkml' can let your native code use ordinary Windows libraries without ABI conflicts. You can also distribute your executables without the license headache of redistributing or statically linking `libgcc_s_seh' and `libstdc++'                      
   `dkml-base-compiler'                  `ocaml-base-compiler'     On macOS, `setup-dkml' cross-compiles to ARM64 with `dune -x darwin_arm64'                                                                                                                                                                                               
   CentOS 7 and Linux distros from 2014  Latest Ubuntu             On Linux, `setup-dkml' builds with an old GLIBC. `setup-dkml' dynamically linked Linux executables will be highly portable as GLIBC compatibility issues should be rare, and compatible with the unmodified LGPL license used by common OCaml dependencies like [GNU MP] 
   0 yrs                                 4 yrs                     `setup-ocaml' is officially supported and well-tested.                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
   Some pinned packages                  No packages pinned        `setup-dkml', for some packages, must pin the version so that cross-platform patches (especially for Windows) are available. With `setup-ocaml' you are free to use any version of any package                                                                           
   `diskuv/diskuv-opam-repository'       `fdopen/opam-repository'  Custom patches for Windows are sometimes needed. `setup-dkml' uses a much smaller set of patches. `setup-ocaml' uses a large but deprecated set of patches.                                                                                                              
  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

        Put simply, use `setup-dkml' when you are distributing
        executables or libraries to the public. Use `setup-ocaml'
        for all other needs.

  `setup-dkml' will setup the following OCaml build environments for
  you:

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
   ABIs                        Native `ocamlopt' compiler supports building executables for the following operating systems:                                        
  ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
   win32-windows_x86           32-bit Windows [1] for Intel/AMD CPUs                                                                                                
   win32-windows_x86_64        64-bit Windows [1] for Intel/AMD CPUs                                                                                                
   macos-darwin_all            64-bit macOS for Intel and Apple Silicon CPUs. Using `dune -x darwin_arm64' will cross-compile to both; otherwise defaults to Intel. 
   manylinux2014-linux_x86     32-bit Linux: CentOS 7, CentOS 8, Fedora 32+, Mageia 8+, openSUSE 15.3+, Photon OS 4.0+ (3.0+ with updates), Ubuntu 20.04+           
   manylinux2014-linux_x86_64  64-bit Linux: CentOS 7, CentOS 8, Fedora 32+, Mageia 8+, openSUSE 15.3+, Photon OS 4.0+ (3.0+ with updates), Ubuntu 20.04+           
  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  Thanks to the [OCaml Software Foundation (OCSF)] for their support of
  DKML. Enjoy!


[GitHub Action setup-ocaml]
<https://github.com/marketplace/actions/set-up-ocaml>

[opam-monorepo] <https://github.com/ocamllabs/opam-monorepo#readme>

[MSYS2] <https://www.msys2.org/>

[https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-workflows#readme]
<https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-workflows#readme>

[GNU MP] <https://gmplib.org/manual/Copying>

[OCaml Software Foundation (OCSF)] <https://ocaml-sf.org/>


Diskuv OCaml 1.x.x; Windows OCaml installer no longer in preview
════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

  Archive:
  <https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-diskuv-ocaml-1-x-x-windows-ocaml-installer-no-longer-in-preview/10309/1>


jbeckford announced
───────────────────

  Diskuv OCaml (DKML) has graduated to version 1.0.0. That means you'll
  see DKML listed as a Windows option for OCaml on the various OCaml
  websites soon.

  To recap … by following the simple [download and install instructions
  for Windows] you will get:
  • OCaml 4.12.1
  • `dune' and `opam' working transparently as if you were on Unix
  • a `playground' Opam switch so you can start coding without having to
    learn many Opam commands
  • your Opam switches supported by the Visual Studio OCaml plugin
  • all the prerequisites you need for OCaml programming:
    • a C compiler and assembler (Visual Studio Build Tools)
    • a UNIX environment (MSYS2; mostly you won't see it)
    • source control (Git for Windows)
  • support! File an issue at
    [https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-installer-ocaml/issues]. I don't
    promise your Windows issue will be fixed, but it will be reviewed.

  Changes since 0.4.0:
  • An uninstaller. Now you can Add and Remove "Diskuv OCaml" from the
    Control Panel
  • The old GitLab repository at
    [https://gitlab.com/diskuv/diskuv-ocaml] is being retired. There
    will be a new GitLab repository with much more testing capacity that
    will be online in the next few months.

  Full documentation is at
  [https://diskuv.gitlab.io/diskuv-ocaml/#introduction].

  /Package maintainers/: Have a look at the [just announced
  `setup-dkml'] to test your own GitHub packages using most of the
  Windows functionality listed above.

  Thanks (again!) to the [OCaml Software Foundation (OCSF)] for their
  support of DKML. Please consider becoming a contributor to DKML to
  improve the Windows ecosystem. Enjoy!


[download and install instructions for Windows]
<https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-installer-ocaml#installing>

[https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-installer-ocaml/issues]
<https://github.com/diskuv/dkml-installer-ocaml/issues>

[https://gitlab.com/diskuv/diskuv-ocaml]
<https://gitlab.com/diskuv/diskuv-ocaml>

[https://diskuv.gitlab.io/diskuv-ocaml/#introduction]
<https://diskuv.gitlab.io/diskuv-ocaml/#introduction>

[just announced `setup-dkml']
<https://discuss.ocaml.org/t/ann-setup-dkml-yml-github-actions-workflow-for-distributing-binaries/10308>

[OCaml Software Foundation (OCSF)] <https://ocaml-sf.org/>


Old CWN
═══════

  If you happen to miss a CWN, you can [send me a message] and I'll mail
  it to you, or go take a look at [the archive] or the [RSS feed of the
  archives].

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  [Alan Schmitt]


[send me a message] <mailto:alan.schmitt@polytechnique.org>

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[online] <http://lists.idyll.org/listinfo/caml-news-weekly/>

[Alan Schmitt] <https://alan.petitepomme.net/>


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