cabal reports "/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lHSrandom-1.0.1.1-ghc7.8.3"

Question

I have Ubuntu 14.04LTS. I downloaded the latest ghc-7.8.3 from http://www.haskell.org/ghc/download_ghc_7_8_3#x86_64linux and installed it to /usr/local.

Then I updated my cabal to version 1.20.0.3.

I typed cabal install QuickCheck into my terminal, and got:

Resolving dependencies...
Configuring tf-random-0.5...
Building tf-random-0.5...
Preprocessing library tf-random-0.5...
[1 of 4] Compiling System.Random.TF.Gen ( src/System/Random/TF/Gen.hs, dist/build/System/Random/TF/Gen.o )
[2 of 4] Compiling System.Random.TF.Init ( src/System/Random/TF/Init.hs, dist/build/System/Random/TF/Init.o )

src/System/Random/TF/Init.hs:94:5: Warning:
    In the use of ‘bitSize’ (imported from Data.Bits):
    Deprecated: "Use 'bitSizeMaybe' or 'finiteBitSize' instead"
[3 of 4] Compiling System.Random.TF.Instances ( src/System/Random/TF/Instances.hs, dist/build/System/Random/TF/Instances.o )
[4 of 4] Compiling System.Random.TF ( src/System/Random/TF.hs, dist/build/System/Random/TF.o )
/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lHSrandom-1.0.1.1-ghc7.8.3
collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
Failed to install tf-random-0.5
cabal: Error: some packages failed to install:
QuickCheck-2.7.5 depends on tf-random-0.5 which failed to install.
tf-random-0.5 failed during the building phase. The exception was:
ExitFailure 1

BTW, I already have haskell-platform with ghc-7.6.3 installed via apt-get before.

Answer 1

I remember having a similar issue when setting up ghc-7.8. It has something to do with the new cabal, which somehow isn't compatible with libraries installed with an older versio (but it fails to give the correct problem reason.

Anyway, I think reinstalling the packages in question

cabal install random --reinstall --force-reinstalls 

sets it up so cabal install tf-random should then succeed.