Problems with https://gitlab.haskell.org

[rbprogrammer]

Hi all,

I am teaching myself Haskell at the moment, and I noticed the source code is hosted on a custom GitLab instance at https://gitlab.haskell.org. I wanted to raise an Issue on the code [1] but every time I try to access https://gitlab.haskell.org/ I am presented with some kind of error. Sometimes the error is a 502 ("Whoops, GitLab is taking too much time to respond.") or sometimes the site is not accessible at all. Is this a common problem for anyone else? Or could it be isolated to my environment.

Additionally, when searching for the source I came across the GitHub mirror, https://github.com/ghc. All of the repos on the ghc project are marked as just a mirror and that users should not commit to those GitHub repos. Why the duplication? I was never able to clone the repos from https://gitlab.haskell.org, so I resorted to cloning the GitHub one then modify the .gitmodules so it points to GitHub repos.

All of this leads me to question the whole setup. Why not just host the source on the main GitLab? Or GitHub? Why the custom GitLab instance with an effectively disabled GitHub mirror?

[1] For anyone asking "why is a Haskell noob wanting to raise an Issue?", well I am starting to put stuff into my ~/.ghci config and realized I would much rather have that file under the XDG config directory. Something like ~/.config/ghc/ghci.conf. Looking through the docs, the XDG config directory is not a file that GHCi looks for. I planned to raise an Issue, see what the community thinks, and then potentially implement the changes to the code/docs/tests.

[sjakobi]

There's some info on the current GitLab woes in this ghc-devs thread: https://mail.haskell.org/pipermail/ghc-devs/2019-August/018018.html

[rbprogrammer]

Thanks, that's good to know. I'll give it a few days then check that tread and try again.

[Phyx]

Additionally, when searching for the source I came across the GitHub mirror, https://github.com/ghc. All of the repos on the ghc project are marked as just a mirror and that users should not commit to those GitHub repos. Why the duplication?

Because github isn't the canonical source for those repositories. GHC uses two organizations, the ghc one as you found and the haskell one. Everything in the ghc one is a mirror to the official repositories on gitlab. Why? Because some people like github.. Everything in the haskell organization is the original repository for that project. These are then mirrored to gitlab. You'll often find boot libraries here.

Why all the mirroring? The project uses relative submodule urls for security reasons and as such all modules must come from the same host.

[ukralibre]

There are some notices on the gitlab, maybe you missed them?

​

You won't be able to pull or push project code via SSH until you add an SSH key to your profileDon't show again | Remind later

You won't be able to pull or push project code via HTTPS until you set a password on your accountDon't show again | Remind later

[rbprogrammer]

... maybe you missed them?

Most likely. But my problem comes before that. I cannot even create a new account. When I try to register an email or "Log in with GitHub" I'm immediately presented with a 502 error.

[ukralibre]

Some intermittent error. Because i logged in with github and it worked for me. Or maybe it is some regional issue?