plinthc

Install plinthc

plinthc (plinthc) is distributed as a custom tool named plinthc for ghcup, the standard installer for Haskell toolchains. Installing it via ghcup, as described here, is the recommended way to get it. To work on the compiler itself, or when no binary distribution covers your platform, build it from source instead.

Install via ghcup

You need ghcup 0.2.1.0 or newer (check with ghcup --version). Add the plinthc release channel, then install and activate the tool:

$ ghcup config add-release-channel https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ican-group/plinthc/ghcup-channel/ghcup-plinthc.yaml
$ ghcup install plinthc 9.12.170.1
$ ghcup set plinthc 9.12.170.1

ghcup install downloads the binary distribution for your platform and installs it under ghcup’s own directory; ghcup set then links plinthc and plinthc-pkg (the compiler’s own ghc-pkg) into ghcup’s bin directory (~/.ghcup/bin by default), which is already on PATH for ghcup users. Verify with:

$ plinthc --version

Installing plinthc does not affect any GHC installed by ghcup: only plinthc* binaries are put on PATH, so your regular ghc is left untouched.

Supported platforms

Binary distributions are published for:

  • Linux, x86_64 and aarch64 (glibc, and musl/Alpine)
  • macOS, Apple Silicon
  • Windows, x86_64

List the available versions with ghcup list -t plinthc.

GHC 9.6-based releases

plinthc is released on two GHC versions. The version number tells them apart: 9.12.<plinth>.<n> is based on GHC 9.12 and is the recommended one; 9.6.<plinth>.<n> is based on GHC 9.6. Both compile the same Plinth version (the third component: 170 is Plinth 1.70) and produce the same kind of Plutus Core.

Use a 9.6-based release if your project or one of its dependencies does not build with GHC 9.12 yet:

$ ghcup install plinthc 9.6.170.1
$ ghcup set plinthc 9.6.170.1

Then use plinthc-9.6.170.1 and plinthc-pkg-9.6.170.1 in your cabal.project (see Use plinthc in a project), and the ghc-plinth-plutus commit of that release: 1a74ed2d09f333ac516a0e49328cd62053ff4c9d.

Once installed, head over to Use plinthc in a project.