IHaskell is an implementation of the IPython kernel protocol which allows you to use Haskell inside IPython frontends such as qtconsole
and notebook
.
The project works with the IPython shell:
As well as the IPython browser-based notebook interface:
Download the package from the Github repository:
git clone https://github.com/gibiansky/IHaskell
Install ZeroMQ:
sudo apt-get install libzmq1 # Ubuntu
brew install zeromq # Macs with Homebrew
Install the package:
cd IHaskell;
cabal install --only-dependencies;
cabal configure;
cabal build;
cabal install;
Create the IPython profile:
IHaskell setup
Run the notebook or console interface:
IHaskell notebook # Should open a browser window!
IHaskell console
There is a test notebook in the IHaskell
directory.
IHaskell is an extremely young project, and I'd love your help getting it to a stable and useful point. There's a lot to do, and if you'd like to contribute, feel free to get in touch with me via my email at andrew period gibiansky at gmail - although browsing the code should be enough to get you started, I'm more than happy to answer any questions myself.
Some ideas for improvements:
- Type annotations. When a statement is evaluated, the GHC API returns the names of all bound variables. It should be possible to take those names and find the types of the variables, and display them in a table via the
display_data
message. - Implementing useful directives. Currently, support for GHCi-style ":"-initiated directives exist, but they do not do anything (and are instead just printed in green). Useful directives such as ":t" and ":i" and ":m [+-]" have yet to be implemented, and adding them would be a good way to get started with the codebase.
- Parsing and viewing of formats via
display_data
and HTML:aeson
compatibility which displays JSON as syntax highlighted JSON code via HTML.- Support for
repa
orhmatrix
vectors and matrices being displayed. - `A custom typeclass for displaying data types as HTML, similar to Show.
Take a look at the developer notes as well - they are sparse but may be helpful.
Before diving in, you should read the brief description of IPython kernel architectures and read the complete messaging protocol specification.
Skim the rather-lacking Haddock documentation.
Module Quickstart:
Main
: Argument parsing and basic messaging loop, using Haskell Chans to communicate with the ZeroMQ sockets.IHaskell.Types
: All message type definitions.IHaskell.Eval.Evaluate
: Wrapper around GHC API, exposing a singleevaluate
interface that runs a statement, declaration, import, or directive.IHaskell.IPython
: Shell scripting wrapper usingShelly
for thenotebook
,setup
, andconsole
commands.IHaskell.Message.Parser
: Parsing messages received from IPython.IHaskell.Message.UUID
: UUID generator and data structure.IHaskell.Message.Writer
:ToJSON
for Messages.IHaskell.ZeroMQ
: Low-level ZeroMQ communication wrapper.serveProfile
starts listening on all necessary sockets, and returns aZeroMQInterface
record. This record exposes reading and writingChan Message
messages for all the necessary sockets, so then the rest of the application can simply use that interface.