haskell / haskell/cabal

Misspelled user-flags (`-f`) are silently ignored

Open
#7,813 8 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub
re: flag re: options type: enhancement
Dominant language
Haskell
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Forks
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Avg merge
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Merged PRs (30d)
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Description

Misspelled user-flags (`-f`) are silently ignored. In the wild:
```
$ cabal install -w ghc-9.0.1 cabal-plan
...
$ cabal-plan license-report fix-whitespace
ERROR: `cabal-plan license-report` sub-command not available! Please recompile/reinstall `cabal-plan` with the `license-report` Cabal flag activated.
...
$ cabal install -w ghc-9.0.1 -f licence-report cabal-plan
Resolving dependencies...
Up to date
Copying 'cabal-plan' to ...

$ cabal-plan license-report fix-whitespace
ERROR: `cabal-plan license-report` sub-command not available! Please recompile/reinstall `cabal-plan` with the `license-report` Cabal flag activated.
```
Swallowing errors: not a good UI.

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

Research direction

Start by reproducing the misspelled `-f licence-report` command shown in the issue, then trace how cabal-install handles user flags during dependency resolution and installation. The work is done when an unknown or misspelled flag is rejected with a clear error instead of being silently ignored, while valid flags continue to work.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
haskell
Domain
build-system, cli
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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