F# seems like a very nice language, but it won't really be compelling outside of the Microsoft bubble until it's divorced from the thick layer of Microsoft .CORP Brand Identity 2010, Visual Studio Visual Studio Visual Studio, and posts from Microsoft Outreach Engineers.
Compare these two Stack Overflow "getting started with" answers for Haskell http://stackoverflow.com/a/1016986 and F# http://stackoverflow.com/a/11974625 With the Haskell answers I don't know or care what platforms, operating systems, editors, or IDEs they are using. With the Microsoft answer it's like a dystopian scene filled with Branding, Branding, and more Branding.
Personally, I spend a lot of time experimenting with languages and ecosystems and the ".NET" platform is the only one where I feel the need to put on a plaid shirt and dockers with a Windows Phone on my belt and schedule a conference call with a committee at Microsoft to tell them to give it a rest already.
Not sure about linux, but should be simple as well.
And as with Haskell and cabal, you have FAKE ( http://fsharp.github.io/FAKE/ ) which isn't exactly the same but similar
The main difference between those two answers is that for Haskell, the author pointed to generic Haskell resources while F# pointed to windows ones. I've been developing with F# for a while on the Mac and found no issues whatsoever. There is also MonoDevelop/Xamarin if you want a more complete IDE which is better than anything I found for Haskell (but there maybe new stuff I'm missing, having messed with Haskell in a while) but SublimeText and Vim work fine.
Compare these two Stack Overflow "getting started with" answers for Haskell http://stackoverflow.com/a/1016986 and F# http://stackoverflow.com/a/11974625 With the Haskell answers I don't know or care what platforms, operating systems, editors, or IDEs they are using. With the Microsoft answer it's like a dystopian scene filled with Branding, Branding, and more Branding.
Personally, I spend a lot of time experimenting with languages and ecosystems and the ".NET" platform is the only one where I feel the need to put on a plaid shirt and dockers with a Windows Phone on my belt and schedule a conference call with a committee at Microsoft to tell them to give it a rest already.