[muteh]

I know you're just being glib, but here are some answers: * build doesn't mean compile * you can compile your build process and then use that to actually run your build * the benefits of typed languages go beyond catching errors at compile time

[cgrubb]

There are tools like ocamlbuild and cabal, which are implemented in Ocaml and Haskell, and used to build Ocaml and Haskell.

But ocamlbuild doesn't have a build file. It just knows how to build Ocaml. And build Ocaml is about all it can do. Cabal is powered by a .cabal file, which is a data structure, and a Setup.hs file, which is run like a shell script via runhaskell.

I think what tikhonj envisions would be a lot of work to achieve. Maybe he already knows that. I suspect that the closest most of us will ever get is putting something like this at the top of a Makefile :)

     .ONESHELL:
     SHELL = /usr/bin/runhaskell