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Comment by bigjimslade | Hacker News Reader

I really wanted to like OCaml, still do. I gave it a good shot a couple of years ago, wrote a few basic programs and loved it.

But it to me seemed packaged like many languages in the days of yore, when a language shipped simply as a compiler, and nothing more. The way of the world today to me seems to be a compiler, together with a complete standard library and consistent packaging system.

My experience with OCaml was thwarted repeatedly by a byzantine exploration process of packages depending on other packages, which required other packaging systems. Once I reached that point where it felt like I was spending more time figuring out the complex ecosystem, rather than writing code, I rapidly lost interest.

And perhaps such a point comes in exploring any new language. But it came much too early for me in OCaml. I had so much more I wanted to learn, but couldn't. I am hopeful for the new release. Thank you for your efforts, OCaml team.

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A couple of years ago, opam was the recommended package manager and dune was the recommended build system–just as today. The opam package index was also searchable for libraries. The OCaml website may have been slightly less clear about these things than it is now, but I think a reasonable user would have been able to find them, especially if they went to the forum and asked. People would have gladly answered questions.

I don't think that's totally fair. The Up and Running page of the OCaml website (https://ocaml.org/learn/tutorials/up_and_running.html) was added during 2020. Before that it lacked a straighforward introduction on what you need and how to install it. Node, Go and Rust all come with the package manager, and Rust even comes with a way of managing the different Rust versions. The essential part are here, and everything works well, but for new users it lacks polishing. You can argue that it would take a lot of time for a community that is a bit short on manpower, and that's true. But in the end the experience isn't as good as with other ecosystems.

Let's take a look at the page around this time two years ago.

Landing page: https://web.archive.org/web/20191002202720/https://ocaml.org...

From which you can click through to the Install page: https://web.archive.org/web/20190819032815/https://ocaml.org...

Over there the second and third lines are:

> The OCaml compiler and libraries can be installed in several ways:

> - With OPAM, the OCaml package manager (recommended).

That points you to the opam install instructions, which looks pretty similar to what it does now.

Look, I agree with you that OCaml installation and tooling are not the easiest to get into. But it wasn't like what the GP was making it out to be.

There's no mention of dune on the old page, which sounds like what they were looking for.

> Look, I agree with you that OCaml installation and tooling are not the easiest to get into. But it wasn't like what the GP was making it out to be.

I disagree with your interpretation of the initial post. Notice the "But it to me seemed" and "My experience with OCaml", and also "The way of the world today to me seems to be". These things are important. They inform us that that person is not exposing a truth, but sharing an experience, and personal preferences. They are also, I think, a way of saying "I don't know if the installation process was too hard, or if it was me that didn't understood something, but what I know is that in the end it didn't work out.".

So at this point, you have multiple options. You can empathize, you can work hard on trying to solve the issues on your end, assuming they are on your end, which might not be the case, you can ignore the post. What, I think, you shouldn't do is to deny this experience and imply that that person is "unreasonable".

Not sure when you tried it, but as a newcomer I have the impression packaging has got a lot better in the past few years.

I didn't have the experience you described (not yet anyway!).

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