Include release file manifests and track them in a changelog
Motivation
Packagers and redistributors of GHC, such as Linux distributions, have automation that is sensitive to the internal structure of GHC release files. When this changes, they need to adapt their tools, but today it can be difficult to know that a change has occurred or to find out what needs to be done without lots of experimentation.
Proposal
- Release files should contain a manifest describing their contents
- Changes to these manifests between releases should be documented in the changelog
- CI should be used to ensure that the manifest changes are documented and that the manifests are accurate
This is from the GHC prioritization process.