cabal fetch without recursive package download

[bos]

(Imported from Trac #612, reported by guest on 2009-11-27)

Sometimes I want to install a package from Hackage and the dependencies cannot be satisfied. Thus 'cabal install' refuses to work. Now I like to download the package in order to inspect the Cabal file. Sometimes it contains switches that may reduce dependencies, or I can add such switches, say because the offending dependencies only apply to the test executables or examples. However, also 'cabal fetch' refuses to work, because the dependencies cannot be resolved. Thus I like to say something like 'cabal fetch --disable-recursive-download package'.

[bos]

(Imported comment by @dcoutts on 2009-11-27)

Of course if you're using it just to inspect the contents of the package then you can use cabal unpack blah.

The fetch command is mainly so you can install packages when offline, so in that case you do really need the dependencies or you'll end up screaming and shouting when you get on the train and find that not all the deps were downloaded.

Of course we could possibly print a message in the case that fetch cannot resolve deps to suggest unpack.

It would also be possible of course to have a no-deps flag, see the existing ticket on this issue #423.