Installation

Fixen is a Haskell library and executable. You can use it in two ways: as a standalone compiler tool installed on your system, or as a dependency in your Haskell project. Both approaches are covered below.

Prerequisites

Before installing Fixen, ensure you have the following installed. We recommend using GHCup for managing GHC and cabal versions (ghcup set ghc 9.12.2 and ghcup set cabal 3.16.1.0).

GHC

Fixen requires GHC 9.12.2 (base 4.21.0.0).

Terminal

~ $ ghc --version
The Glorious Glasgow Haskell Compilation System, version 9.12.2

Cabal

Fixen requires Cabal 3.16+.

Terminal

~ $ cabal --version
cabal-install version 3.16.1.0
compiled using version 3.16.1.0 of the Cabal library (in-tree)

Git

Fixen is distributed via GitHub. Git is needed to clone the repository.

Terminal

~ $ git --version

Install

Install Fixen as a standalone command-line tool. After installation, you can compile .fix files from anywhere on your system.

1. Clone the Fixen repository

   Terminal

   ~ $ git clone https://github.com/plilab/fixen.git
   ~ $ cd fixen

2. Build and install the fixen executable

   Terminal

   ~/fixen $ cabal install fixen

   This installs the fixen binary to your Cabal user binary directory (typically ~/.cabal/bin). Make sure this directory is in your PATH.

3. Verify the installation

   Terminal

   ~ $ fixen --help

   You should see the help output describing the available options.

Once installed, you can compile Fixen programs with:

Terminal

~ $ fixen --output Output.hs Input.fix

Tip

If you are developing Fixen itself and want to use the local source, you can run:

Terminal

~ $ cabal run fixen -- --output Output.hs Input.fix

This builds and runs the Fixen compiler from source without installing it globally.

Next Steps

Now that you have Fixen installed, move on to Your First Program to learn the basic workflow of writing and compiling a Fixen program.