Tony Morris

doesn't work for me, and I've spent a lot of time trying to help people who use it

Regardless of what you think of stack, it has its place. I'd never have learned Haskell if stack hadn't made getting started simple.

Yes you would have :)

On my old computer I couldn't install haskell globally due to a combination of things, stack allowed local installs that got around issues.

GHC can be installed locally without stack. Been doing it for 15 years.

Right but I wouldn't have figured it out, my point is that beginners are deterred easily; I couldn't initially figure it out.

I've been teaching beginners for * years. I'm certain stack has never helped anyone. It's easy to make the mistake of believing otherwise.